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in 2011 with funding from 
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kT^u^s^^ o?, l Lcu^/^ 



KVED fflOMA SPECIAL PHOTO ORAFH EXPRE S SLY TOR THISWQRK . 
A.D.WCmTHLNGTON & CO. .PUBLISHERS, HART-FORD, CON.N. 



OUR JOURNEY 

AROUND THE WORLD 

&n Hlustratefc Eccorti of a gear's Erabrl 



OF FORTV THOUSAND MILKS THROUGH 



INDIA, CHINA, JAPAN, AUSTEALIA, NEW ZEALAND, EGYPT, PAL- 
ESTINE, GREECE, TURKEY, ITALY, FRANCE, SPAIN, Etc. 



BY 



Rev. FRANCIS E. CLARK, D.D, 

ytestOcnl of ttic SSnitrti fioctrtg of Christian ISnticauot 



GLIMPSES OF LIFE IN FAR OFF LANDS 

$te g>ttn Ejjrouoft a SHoman's ISges 



BY 

y 
Mrs. Harriet E. Clark 



WITH STEEL-PLATE PORTRAITS, AND UPWARDS OF TWO HUNDRED CHOICE 

ENGRAVINGS, MAINLY FROM INSTANTANEOUS PHOTOGRAPHS TAKEN 

FROM LIFE, REPRODUCED IN FACSIMILE BY EMINENT 

ARTISTS ; AND A MAP SHOWING THE AUTHOR'S 

JOURNEY AROUND THE WORLD 



SOLD ONLY BY SUB SCRIP TIOW MM 'A«* 18! 



HARTFORD, CONN. 
A. D. WORTHESTGTON & CO., PUBLISHEES 
1894 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1894, 

By A. D. Worthington & Company, 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. 



XLO THHbOm It /IlNaV> COnCCril : — Notice is hereby given by the publishers that the 
ww w»uwm i.u« K wvuwwm. gale of this booki » 0UR JOURNEY AROUND 

THE WORLD," by subscription only, is protected by decisions of the United States Courts. 
These decisions are by the U. S. Circuit Court of Ohio, rendered by Judge Hammond, and by 
the U. S. Circuit Court of Pennsylvania, rendered by Judge Butler, and are that " when a sub- 
scription book publishing house, in connection with the author, elects to sell a book purely 
bij subscription and does so sell it, through agents that are agents in the legal sense and not 
independent purchasers of the books, the house and author are entitled to the protection of 
the Courts against any bookseller who invades their rights by an attempt to buy and sell a 
book so published and sold." 

Hence, this is to notify booksellers and the public that all our agents are under contract, 
as our agents, to sell this book by subscription only. They have no right whatever to sell it 
in any other way, as books are furnished to them only for delivery to individual subscribers; 
and any interference with our agents to induce them to sell contrary to their contract obliga- 
tions and our rights, or any 6ale of this book by any one not an authorized agent will entitle 
us to the protection of the Courts. 

Notice is also hereby given that this copy of "OUR JOURNEY AROUND THE 
WORLD" can be identified wherever found together with the name of the agent to whom the 
publishers supplied it; and the detection of the person selling it to the trade, and the offer- 
ing of it tor sale by a bookseller will be sufficient justification for us to institute summary 
proceedings against both bookseller and agent. 

We trust this notice will be received in the kindly spirit in which it is given, as it is made 
simply 10 protect the author, ourselves, and our agents against infringements which rob us of 
the legitimate fruits of our labor and investment. 

Agents and ail other persons are requested to inform us at once of the offering of this 
booK for salt by any bookseller, or by any person not our accredited agent. 

THE PUBLISHERS. 



Be&tcateD 

TO 

£be fatber an& .flfeotber 

WHO 

FOLLOWED THIS JOURNEY 

WITH 

LOVING INTEREST AND EARNEST PRAYERS 





HIS book is a record of a long 
journey, such as, owing to the 
peculiar circumstances attending 
it, does not often fall to the lot of 
man to make. The ordinary trip 
around the world — a common 
enough thing in these days — 
largely follows certain well-de- 
fined routes of travel from Amer- 
ica to Japan, China, India, Egypt, 
Palestine, and thence to America 
again, via Europe. The traveler 
necessarily is obliged to keep in these lanes of travel, 
especially in the far East, and the objects he sees are largely 
those which the guide-book and a paid conductor point out 
to him. 

In the journey described in these pages we were " per- 
sonally conducted" by kind friends, familiar residents of 
every country which we visited. We were able to see 
phases of life and national characteristics usually denied the 
hasty traveler, and we have tried to share them with our 
readers, and in our tour to conduct them over the same 
Toute made so pleasant for us. 

(vii) 



Vlll PREFACE. 

Some months before this journey began we received 
numerous pressing and hearty invitations to visit Christian 
Endeavor conventions in the different colonies of Australia. 

These invitations were supplemented by many others 
from missionaries and other residents in Japan, China, India, 
Turkey, Spain, France, and England. It was to attend 
these conventions and to visit these mission stations that the 
journey was undertaken. At the same time, though the 
conventions and other engagements were very numerous, 
leisure was afforded between the meetings for sight-seeing, 
which was made doubly valuable by our kind and generous 
hosts who served so often as our guides, piloting us to the 
very spots we wanted to visit, and showing us the oddities 
and unique customs and Avays of living which otherwise we 
should have missed. They often took us into the homes of 
the natives, and introduced us to their manner of domestic 
life. 

To these hosts and guides, whose kindness, if space per- 
mitted, I should like to acknowledge in detail, and whose 
names I should like to record in full, is due anything of 
special or unique interest that may be found in these pages. 

Little is said about the special object of the journey, or 
the scores of meetings we attended, or the many delightful 
conventions in which we had part. The relation of the 
journey to the Christian Endeavor movement has been dis- 
cussed in other publications, and this volume is distinctly a 
book of travel. 

Yet, though it contains little moralizing, it is devoutly 
hoped that these pictures of life and scenes in many lands 
may create a warm interest in the heart of every reader in 
the people to whom English-speaking missionaries have 
gone, and in the noble Avork that these missionaries are 
doing ; and that these pictures may also illustrate the world- 



PREFACE. IX 

wide brotherhood, and blessed international and interdenomi- 
national fellowship, of the Christian Endeavor movement. 

It only remains to be said that the names of two of the 
"pilgrims" may be found upon the title page, and that "the 
little pilgrim" was a lad of thirteen, who, to say the least, 
got quite as much fun out of the trip as did his father and 
mother. 

As may be imagined, the journey was not, by any means, 
a mere holiday trip, though the holiday side of it is usually 
presented in these chapters. 

A supplementary chapter will give members of En- 
deavor societies, and others particularly interested, some 
knowledge of the results of the journey ; while the addi- 
tional chapters from the feminine pilgrim will show her sis- 
ters some glimpses of life in far-off lands, and tell how the 
wide world looks through a woman's eyes. 




1r£U*4>C<f 



<£, Ct&us/fC 




wm®i*m 




Shown in Red Lines on the Map. 

FROM Boston to New York ; thence to San Francisco ; 
thence to Honolulu, Sandwich Islands ; thence to 
Samoa, Navigator's Islands ; thence to Auckland, 
New Zealand ; thence to Sydney, Australia ; thence by rail 
to Melbourne and Adelaide, and return same way to Bris- 
bane ; from Brisbane by sea to Port Darwin ; thence to 
Hong Kong ; thence by land to Canton, and return to Hong- 
Kong ; thence to Yokohama ; thence b}^ rail to Tokio ; 
thence by rail to Kioto and Kobe ; thence to Shanghai by 
sea ; thence to Hong Kong again by water ; thence to Co- 
lombo, Ceylon, through the Straits of Sumatra ; thence to 
Tuticorin, in Southern India; thence by rail to Madras; 
thence by water to Calcutta ; thence overland across North- 
ern India, via Lucknow and Agra, to Bombay ; thence 
across the Arabian Sea and through the Red Sea to Ismalia ; 
thence by rail to Cairo; thence by rail to Alexandria; 
thence by sea to Jaffa ; thence to Jerusalem and back to 
Jaffa by rail ; thence by sea to Beyrout ; thence by sea to 
Mersin ; thence overland through Turkey, through the 
Cilician Gates, via Caesarea and Angora, to Constantinople ; 
thence by water to Athens; thence by rail to Patras; 
thence by water to Brindisi; thence by rail to Naples, 
Rome, Genoa, and Marseilles, to San Sebastian in Spain ; 
thence to Paris, London, Glasgow, Belfast, and Dublin ; 
thence to Liverpool ; thence to Queenstown ; thence to New 

York. 

(x) 




Qttatnlg from ^peciaC $3otograp$6 itx&m from fetfe erpressfg for 
f0ts n^orS. QReprobuceo in facsimile Bg (Bminenf (^prttetB. 



Portrait of Rev. Francis E. Clark, D. D. (§uff Cbage), Frontispiece. 

Engraved on Steel by John J. Cade, from a Photograph taken expressly for this work. 

PAGE. 

Ornamental Heading to Preface, . . . . . . .7 

Ornamental Initlvl Letter, ........ 7 

Engraved Autograph of Francis E. Clark, 9 

The Steamship Mariposa 9 

Ornamental Heading to Itinerary of the Author's Journey, 10 
New Imperial Map of the World (Suff Cpage\ • • To face 10 

Showing the Author's " Journey Around the World " from the beginning to the 
end. (Engraved and printed by W. & A. K. Johnston, Edinburgh, Scotland, 
expressly for this work.) 

Ornamental Heading to List of Illustrations, . . . .13 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 20 

Ornamental Heading to Table of Contents, . . . .21 

Ornamental Heading, Chapter I, 37 

Ornamental Initial Letter, . , 37 

Diagram of a Shuffle-Board, 46 

Ornamental Tail Piece, . . .49 

Ornamental Initial Letter, . 50 

Young Swimmers of Honolulu, 52 

Samoan Girls Making Kava, 62 

All that Remains of the "Adler," 63 

A Maori House, 65 

Maori Idols, 66 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 67 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 68 

(xiii) 



XIV 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGE. 

Male Aboriginal Australian, . ■ 72 

Female Aboriginal Australian, .73 

Aboriginal Method op Producing Fire, 74 

In the Grounds op Government House, Sydney, ... 77 

In the Bush, 83 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 84 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 85 

In Adelaide, 87 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 99 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 100 

Aboriginal Australian, 104 

In one op Melbourne's Parks, 109 

Ready for the Descent into a Gold Mine, . . . .111 

Ornamental Tail Piece 114 

Ornamental Initial Letter, . . . . . . . .115 

In a Corner op the Steerage Deck — Chinese Gambling on 
Shipboard. (Suff Cbage. From an instantaneous photograph.) 

To face 122 

Squatting on their haunches in a corner of the steerage deck was another 
circle of Chinese Gamblers, throwing dice and playing cards with a dexterity 
acquired only by long experience. They were smoking cigarettes, or curious 
pipes with minute bowls, which when not in use they tucked behind their ears 
until they desired another whiff. 

Aboriginal Australian, . 125 

"Backy," "Backy," 129 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 131 

A Young Citizen of Port Darwin, . . . . , .135 

A North Queensland Aboriginal, 136 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 148 

A Chinese Forge, 151 

A Chinese Execution. {From an instantaneous photograph.) . . 155 
Placing the Head op an Executed Criminal in a Basket. 

{From an instantaneous photograph.) ...... 15ft 

Taking a Condemned Pirate to the Place of Execution. 

(Suff Cbaae. From an instantaneous photograph.) . To face 156 
Prisoners under sentence of death wear bamboo yokes when they are taken to 

the place of execution. The head of the prisoner is placed between two rigid 

bamboo bars, one in front, and the other at the back of the neck, while two 

shorter bars rest across the shoulders and fasten. the long side bars together. 

The headsman accompanies the procession to the field of execution holding his 

keen blade aloft, followed by a crowd of spectators. 

Coolies Pumping "Water for Rice Fields, 159 

Ornament Aii Tail Piece, 163 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 164 

Fishing with Cormorants, 169 

Prisoners in a Canton Jail, 171 

Ornamental Tail Piece _ . . . 178 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 179 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. XV 

PAGE, 

On the Pearl River, 184 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 190 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 191 

Dress op Japanese Women, showing the Obi, .... 301 

A Rural Scene in Japan, 202 

A Tea Drinker's Paradise — Gatherlng the Crop on a Tea 
Plantation. (§uff Cbage. From an instantaneous photograph.) 

To face 205 
The long rows of tea plants look like the bunches of box with which the 
• borders of old-fashioned flower gardens were once made, only the tea plants are 
much larger. When the crop is matured the tea garden is full of pickers, native 
men and women in bright costumes working side by side. 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 205 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 206 

In Winter Costume, 211 

A Nattve Japanese Grist Mill. (Suff Cp&ge. From an instan- 
taneous photograph.) To face 215 

One coolie threshes the rice straw over the iron teeth of a primitive flail which 
looks like a carpenter's wooden horse, while another winnows the grain by pour- 
ing it over a rude sieve, allowing the wind to blow away the chaff ; while still 
another coolie grinds the rice in a mill laboriously turned by hand. 

A Japanese Fruit Store, 216 

Japanese Umbrella Makers, . . . * 217 

In a Japanese Barber Shop, 219 

The Villainous Daikon 222 

The Baby in Japan. (Suff Qbage. From an instantaneous photo- 
graph.) To face 225 

Sometimes the baby has another doll baby on its back, and I have actually 
seen a small doll on the big doll's back, a big doll on the small boy's back, and 
a small boy on his big brother's back ; four generations, as it were, together. 

A Japanese Peasant, 226 

A Jinrikisha, 228 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 230' 

Dignified Damsels at Tea, . . 231 

A Japanese Ceremonial Tea — The Thirty-third Degree op 
Exquisite Politeness. (§uff Cp&jje. From an instantaneous 

photograph.) . To face 236 

For three hundred years the "Ceremonial Tea" has been an institution of 
Japanese life, and ceremonial tea making is taught in the modern schools of the 
government, as it is thought to give dignity and grace and a kind of solemn 
lesson in etiquette. It is impossible to describe the preciseness, suavity, and 
dignified solemnity with which every movement is performed 

In a Bamboo Forest, .... 



Gatherlng the Tea Crop, 

In the Land of the Japonica, 

Entrance to Nagata Temple, Kobe, 

A Japanese Idol and Temple, 

A Buddhist Shrine, .... 



23£ 
240 
242 
245 
246 
248 



XVI 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



An Inland Village, . 

A Wayside Shrine, . 

A Japanese Farmer, . 

Japanese Acrobats, . 

Ornamental Initial Letter. 

A Chinese Rice Mill, 

A Chinese Paper Mill, 

"Hitting the Pipe," . 

Opium Fiends, 

A Leper Girl of Shanghai, 

A Juvenile Chinese Orchestr 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 

Sacred White Oxen, . 

The Bullock Cart, . 

The Famous Basket Trick, 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 

Natives of Southern India, 

A Native Village of Southern In 

Jewels of India, 

Grinding Curry, 

Ornamental Tail Piece, . 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 

A Band of Native Indian Jugglers and Snake Charmers. 
(Suff Cp&ge. From an instantaneous photograph.) . To face 
"If this snake should bite you," said one of these gentry, at the same time 
opening one of the baskets, " you will die in fifteen minutes. If this one 
should bite you," opening another basket, "yon will die in ten minutes." Open- 
ing still another basket, he remarked coolly, " If he should bite you, you will die 
in five minutes," and still another basket was opened with the blood-curdling 
announcement, " If this snake should bite you, you will die in one minute." 

The Great Temple of Madura 

The Painted Corridor in the Temple of Madura, 
The Sacred Tank of Madura, 
Interior of the Great Palace of Madura, 
The Sacred Bull of Siva, ... 
Weavers in the Streets of Madras, 
Child on a Leaf of the Victoria Regia, 
The Popular Madras Hunt, . 
A Wedding Procession in India. (§uff Cbcige. From an instan- 
taneous photograph.) To face 

Three silent treading, knock-kneed, ragged camels led the way, covered with 
bright cloths and much tinsel. There seemed to be little life or merriment 
about the procession, and I presume the poor young girl who was going to the 
home of her aged husband, whom, perhaps, she has never seen, felt as melan- 
choly as the solemn procession seemed to indicate. 

"Bratty" Making 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 

A Calcutta Barber Shop 



PAGE. 

249 

250 

353 

255 

257 

263 

265 

267 

268 

270 

271 

279 

280 

282 

287 

294 

299 

. 301 

. 303 

. 304 

. 310 

. 311 

317 



318 
319 
320 
321 
323 
328 
329 
330 

330 



333 
335 

338 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



XV11 



PAGE. 

A Hindu Faker, 339 

A Long-Haired Fakir, . . . 340 

The Burning Ghat, .343 

A Tower of Silence, 345 

A Hindu Bride, . 349 

A Zenana Carriage op Bombay, 351 

Ornamental Tail Plece, 352 

Ornamental Initial Letter, . 353 

A Native " Turnout," 356 

In the Monkey Temple, • . 359 

Mosque of the Great Imambara, Lucknow, 365 

The Taj Mahal, 368 

Ornamental Initl*.l Letter, 370 

In the Suez Canal, 374 

Donkey Boy op Ismalia, 377 

On the Banks of the Nile, ........ 379 

A Native Egyptlan School. (§uff Cpage. From an instantane- 
ous photograph.) To face 383 

An Egyptian school is a curiosity. The pupils sit on the floor, study their 
lessons aloud, rocking hack and forth, and they make the schoolroom about as 
noisy as a ward political meeting. I generally knew where a schoolroom was at 
least half a minute before I reached its doors. The master squats on the floor, 
or stands among ftiis pupils, who are seated in rows or promiscuously scattered 
through the rest of the apartment. 

Water Carreers Filling theer Goat-Sklns, ..... 388 

Ornamental Initial Letter, , . . 390 

Before a Cairo Coffee House. (§uff Cbage. From an instanta- 
neous photograph.) . - To face 390 

The strange people, the curious costumes, the unfamiliar cries in the street, 
the characteristic crowd of all sorts and conditions of men in front of each 
coffee house, the strange manners and customs of the bazaar, all furnished ma- 
terial for many days of delight in the capital of Egypt. 

Street Musicians and Dancers of Cairo, 

Praying in the Streets of Cairo, . 

Latticed Windows, Cairo, 

Sugar-Cane and Fruit Sellers of Cairo, 

Shoe Peddler of Cairo, .... 

A Bedouin Family on a Journey, . 

In the Bulak Museum, .... 

Mummy over Three Thousand Years Old, of Sethi I, Father 

OF FiAMESES II, — THE PlIARAOH WHO OPPRESSED THE CHIL- 
DREN of Israel, (^uff Cp&jje. From a special photograph.) 

To face 409 

Look into that glass case. There, in that royal gilded coffin, lies a shrunken, 
withered mummy. The lower limbs are yet wrapped in the cerements of the 
grave, but the naked skull is still perfect and visible. The long hooked Roman 
nose, the deep sunken eyeballs, the heavy square jaw, tell of the warrior and the 
tyrant. There is Moses 1 playfellow. For more than three thousand three hun- 
dred years he lay silent in the earth, until at last the mighty secret of his burial 
place was discovered, his coffin was opened, and he was found to tell ns the 
story of the awful oppression and tyranny which he inaugurated so many centu- 
ries ago. 





393 




394 




395 




397 




399 




401 




404 



XV111 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PAGE. 

Full Length View of Mummy of King Pharaoh, Rameses II, 

(the Pharaoh of the Oppression,) 409 

Where the Mummy of Pharaoh was Found,— Entrance to 

the Tomb 411 

Profile of King Pharaoh, 412 

Front View of Pharaoh immediately after Unwinding the 

Mummy 413 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 416 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 417 

The Great Pyramids, 419 

By the Roadside in Egypt, 422 

A Scene on the Nile 426 

The Flight Down the Pyramid, 431 

The Sphinx, 433 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 434 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 435 

Abdallah, Our Dragoman, 444 

Ornamental Initial Letter 447 

Jerusalem and the Surrounding Country. (Suff CbiXQt. From 

a special photograph.) To face 448 

There stands the city proudly on its hills as of yore. It has withstood the 
decay of centuries, the tramp of conquering armies, and the destruction that 
comes in the wake of war and pestilence and conquest. He must be dull indeed 
who looks on Jerusalem for the first time unmoved, as he remembers all that 
has occurred within those time-stained walls. 

Begging Dervishes, Jerusalem, . 455 

A Water Carrier, . . . 458 

Ornamental Tail Piece 468 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 469 

A Street in Jerusalem, 470 

Absalom's Tomb, . 477 

A Bedouin Dinner Party. (§uff Cbage. From an instantaneous 

photograph.) To face 480 

As we neared the village we passed a group of ragged, filthy, sore-eyed speci- 
mens of humanity, squatting on the ground near an old dilapidated tent where 
they had been lazily basking in the sunshine. They were engaged in the inter- 
esting task of simultaneously extending their dirty hands into the one and only 
dish that contained their food. 

A Bedouin Woman, 483 

Rachel's Tomb, 484 

A Girl of Judea, 486 

Ornamental Initial Letter, .' 488 

The Mosque of Omar, 491 

Wailing Place of the Jews, 501 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 504 

The Famous Cedars of Lebanon. (§uff CbaQt. From a special 

photograph) To face 506 

The grove here shown is supposed to have furnished the timber for Solomon's 
Temple, as recorded in the Old Testament. It is now called " The Grove of the 
Lord," and in it are three hundred and ninety-three trees ; of these only twelve 
are of any great size, and thev have received the name of "The Twelve 
Apostles " from a tradition that Christ once visited this spot with his Apostles, 
who planted their staves, which grew into these goodly cedars. 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



XIX 



•uuldou), 



PAGE. 

509 
517 
520 
521 
522 
524 
525 
529 
531 
534 

538 



Druse from Mount Lebanon, . 
Our Turkish Passport, 
A Syrian Woman of the Lower Class, 
A Syrian Woman of the Better Class, 
Our Life Preserver (Facsimile of our Bouyout 
Ornamental Tail Piece, . 
Ornamental Initial Letter, . 
A Ship of the Desert, 
Native Khurds of Asia Minor, 
A Syrian Poultry Seller, 

An Exciting Moment — Our Ride across Turkey in a Wagon 
(Sttff $age.) To face 

Sometimes the rickety wagon would sway perilously on the verge of a rocky 
precipice. Often we would think that it was actually going over, and would 
catch our breath as we expected to see wagon, horses, and driver tumble into the 
terrible abyss. Then the driver would throw himself from side to side of the 
wagon to keep it from toppling over, and the rest of us would throw our weight 
on that side to prevent the threatened catastrophe. 

Musselman at Prayer, 543 

The Call of the Muezzin, 544 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 545 

Mosque of El Azar, 555 

Sidewalk Merchants, Constantinople, 556 

St. Sophia, The Marvelous, 557 

A Whirling Dervish, 559 

A Turkish Beauty, 562 

A Turkish Woman, 565 

A Sultan's Tomb, . . ... . . . . . 566 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 568 

Ornamental Initial Letter, . . 582 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 590 

Portrait of Mrs. Harriet E. Clark (Suff Cpage), • To face 593 
Ornamental Heading to Introduction, 
Ornamental Initial Letter to Introduction, 
Engraved Autograph of Harriet E. Clark, 

Ornamental Initial Letter 

Ornamental Tail Piece, 

Ornamental Initial Letter, 

A Japanese Mother, - 605 

A Japanese Maiden 606 

Carriage Riding in Japan — A Jinrikisha Man in His Rain 
Cloak. (Stiff Cbage. From an instantaneous plwtograpli.) 

To face 

Thus thatched, our jinrikisha man looked almost like an animated haystack. 
His rain cloak covered him almost from head to heels. In the crowded streets 
he was continually shouting at the top of his voice, " Hi-hi " which may be 
translated into English, I suppose, as " Look out there," " (Jet out of the way," 
in order to clear a passage for our little procession. 



593 
593 
593 
595 
602 
603 



606 



XX 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Japanese Refreshments, . 
Washing Day in Japan, . 
Street Children of Japan, 
Ornamental Tail Piece, . 
Ornamental Initial Letter, 
Colombo Children, . 
A Happy Mother, 
Pitiful Little Creatures, 
Ornamental Initial Letter, 
Ornamental Tail Pdsce, . 
Ornamental Initial Letter, 
Good Night,, ... 



ta<;e. 

. 611 

. 612 

. 613 

. 615 

, 616 

. 617 

. 618 

. 619 

. 625 

. 635 

. 636 

. 641 



f oioi fthimBcr of Sl'Custrations, oiq 





CHAPTER I. 

OUR START — LIFE ON AN OCEAN STEAMER. 

The Journey Begun — Daily Life on an Ocean Steamer — Always Journey- 
ing Homeward — Who is "We" — Taking the Reader into our Con- 
fidence — A Parting Look — ' ' God be with You till We Meet Again " 

— The " Mariposa" — Our Fellow Passengers — Gambling on Ship- 
board — Betting on the Day's Run — Where to read "Penny Dread- 
fuls " — Lord Blank and his Guardian — One Day on a Pacific Steamer 

— A Flexible Bath-tub — Something of which there is Enough — At 
the Dinner Table — Sighing for Home-made Bread and Butter — 
Wanted, Milk from a Cow instead of from a Tin Can — Mrs. Bostonese 
Brains — The Tramp, tramp, tramp of the Passengers — Ring-Toss and 
Shuffle-Board — Sunday on the Ocean, ......... 87 



CHAPTER II. 

ACROSS THE PACIFIC OCEAN — SAMOA AND THE SAMOANS— 
NEW ZEALAND'S RUGGED SHORES. 

The Joys of Terra Firma — The Playground of America — Bewildering 
Vegetation — Brown-skinned Divers — Rum and Missionaries — Ten to 
One — The Future of the Hawaiian — Our Departure — "Fire, Fire" 

— Between the Flames and the Sea — An Exciting Race for Life — 
The Navigators Islands — The First Glimpse — The Samoans as Nature 
Made Them — Stalwart Oarsmen — On Shore Again — Costumes not 
from Paris — Babies in Brown Coats — The Great Event of the Month 

— A Splendid Race — The Sabbath Day Holy in Samoa — A Kingly 
Romance — A Royal Salary — Tappa and Kava — An Appetizing Pro- 
cess — Farewell to the Oasis — An Awful Storm — A Mournful Spectre 

— Our Frolicsome Companions — A Week without a Wednesday — An 
Exaggerated English Channel — New Zealand's Stern and Rugged 
Shores — Goodbye Mariposa, . 50 

(xxi) 



XXil CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER III. 

OUR WELCOME TO A NEW CONTINENT — FIRST IMPRES- 
SIONS OF AUSTRALIA. 

A New Continent — A Magnificent Harbor — Torres' Mistake — The 
Flight of the Dove — "The Endeavor" — An Important Astronomi- 
cal Discovery — A Vast Noah's Ark — Great Grandfather Animals — 
The Bushman and His Fate — What the Savage could not do — Un- 
certain Rain and Certain Drought — Australian Oddities — Confused 
Trees — Topsy-Turvyness — Preconceived Notions — The Englishman 
the World Over — The Evolution of the Yankee Drawl — Colonial 
Days — " The Great American Desert " — Mother and Daughter — How 
the Old Lady Treats Her Child — English or American — Architectural 
Differences — Big Names — " Elevator " or " Lift " — " Barber's Shop " 
"Tonsorial Palace" — American Inventions in Australia — The Home 
of Anarchy and Unrest — Country Life versus City Life — The " Bluey" 
and the " Billy " — The " Larrikin " — A "New Chum " — Modesty Be- 
coming a Literary New Chum 68 

CHAPTER IV. 

AUSTRALIA AND AUSTRALIANS — INTERESTING MATTERS 
ABOUT A GREAT COUNTRY — ITS LIFE, ITS CUSTOMS, 
ITS SCENERY, AND ITS PEOPLE. 

The Houses the People Live in — Stone Instead of Wood — An English- 
man's Castle — Plenty of Soil — " Strathroy " versus " 1229 E. 341 St." 

— "Bacchus, Cestus, Festus" — How They Travel — The Railways — 
Inside the House — At the Dinner Table — A Pleasant Custom — 
Scarcity of Cold Water — The Newspapers — Sometimes Dull but 
Seldom Sensational — Some Budding Poets — Specimen of Obituary 
Poetry — Outdoor Life — National Games — A Mighty Curse — The 
Turf Adviser — The Totalisator — Church Life — Great Conventions — 
The Singing — Cable Absurdities — A Mexican Invasion — Kissing his 
Wife on the Street — Gum-chewing Girls — Chicago Girls and Boston 
Maidens — Introducing Friends, 85 

CHAPTER V? 

AUSTRALIA THROUGH AMERICAN EYES — OUR VISIT TO A 
GOLD MINE — RISKING LIFE FOR A FRIEND. 

An Early Definition — A " Personally Conducted " Trip — A Peaceful Land 

— One of its Neighbors — Australia's Only Battle — The Eureka Stock- 
ade — Un warlike Weapons — Hot, Hotter, Hottest — Summer the Pre- 



CONTENTS. XX111 

vailing Season — Ragged and Tattered Trees — A Eucalyptus Country 

— Many "Botany Bays" — Imported Pests — A Pugnacious Little 
Briton — One of Australia's Expensive Problems — The Gentle, Peace- 
loving Bear — The Kangaroo and the Emu — The Kangaroo's Small 
Brother — The Laughing Jackass — A Land of Cities — Tales of Politi- 
cal Corruption — An Exploded Boom — Melbourne the Magnificent — 
Sydney the Picturesque — Adelaide the Lovely — Ballarat the Golden 

— Down in a Gold Mine — Getting Ready to Descend — In Motley 
Array — The Cage — Brave Women — United We Drop — Suppose ! — 
Everything but Gold — A Brave Miner — Risking Life for a Friend — 
That Man was a Christian, " 100 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE CRUISE OF THE CHINGTU—&S INTERESTING VOYAGE 
IN STRANGE COMPANY — IN THE GOLD FIELDS OF 
AUSTRALIA. 

Beginning Our Log-book — Mrs. Pilgrim's Resolve — The CMngtu — A 
Unique and Unusual Journey — Our Steamer — Our Stewards — 
"Loast Beef," " Olange Flittels" and "Lice Cakes" — Preparing for 
Hot Weather — Our Fellow Passengers — Life in the Steerage — Mr. 
Ah See and his Wives — Mrs. Ah See Number One — Photographing 
the Family — The Ruler of the Roost — The Black Fellows — Ce- 
lestials Returning Home — Taking Home Their Own Bones — The 
Chinaman at Dinner — A Race of Squatters — The Fan-tan "Layout" 
— Chinese Passion for Gambling — Within the Barrier Reef — "White 
Man, He too Salt" — Glittering Gold Fields — How Gold was Discov- 
ered in Australia — Nash and His "Find" — "Welcome Strangers" — 
Gold on Brogans — The Romance of the Morgan Mine — A Visit from a 
Native Bushman — "Backy, Backy, Backy" — White Ant Hills — 
Wrecked on a Coral Reef — Thursday Island, 115 



CHAPTER VII. 

THROUGH LITTLE KNOWN COUNTRIES — LIFE IN THE MA- 
LAY ARCHIPELAGO — A BATTLE WITH A SNAKE. 

All the Days of the Week — A Convenient Nomenclature — A Diet of Sea 
Worms — Trade in Bloodsuckers — Reminiscences of My Boyhood — A 
Hideous Delicacy — The Pearl Fishery — Plums in the Pudding — The 
Pearl Diver's Equipment — A Short but not a Merry Life — A Baking 
Day and Steamy Night — The Aborigines — In the Celebes Sea — The 
Connecticut of the South Sea — The Nutmeg at Home — The Possibili- 
ties of a Ball of Twine — How the Bride Wore the Trousers — Euro- 



XXIV CONTENTS. 

pean Clothes and Civilization — A Snake Story — An Unwelcome 
Guest — Dislodging his Serpentship — A Battle with a Python — The 
Spicy Breezes — The Noble Work of the Missionary — How the Chief 
Took the Census — At His Wit's End — A Shrewd Rajah — Some 
Passengers — Some Members of the Feline Tribe — The Tale of Tor- 
toise-shell Tommj^, 131 

CHAPTER VIII. 

OUR ARRIVAL IN CHINA — UNFAMILIAR SIGHTS AND 
NOVEL EXPERIENCES — CHINESE EXECUTIONS — CHINESE 
FARMS AND FARMERS — DOMESTIC LIFE. 

Cosmopolitan Hong Kong — The Cabmen of the Orient — A Ride in a 
Sedan Chair — Uplifted in Spirit — Sidewalk Shops — Pennsylvania Oil 
in China — Fairyland under the Lanterns — Incense Offerings to the 
Gods — Novel Sights and Scenes — Oriental Sharpers — Unblushing 
Swindlers — Toboggan Sliding — All Aboard for Canton — Justice 
Swift and Severe — Executions in China — Heads Chopped off with 
Neatness and Despatch — The River God at the Prow — The Fatshun — 
River Robbers and Pirates — A Floating Arsenal — The Rice Harvest — 
Threshing Out the Rice — " Chinaman Makee Glow" — Three Crops in 
a Season — Water Buffaloes — Christianity and Butter — Up the Pearl 
River — Junks and Flower Boats, Sampans and Slipper Boats — The 
High Road of Canton — A Novel Pontoon Bridge — A Family Picture 
— Cantonese Jade — Off in a Sampan, 148 

CHAPTER IX. 

IN CANTON THE CROWDED — CHINA AND THE CHINESE. 
— CURIOUS SCENES AMONG A CURIOUS PEOPLE — IX 
THE TEMPLE OF HORRORS. 

All Cum, Jr. — A Courteous and Faithful Guide — Aimless Wandering — 
The Birthday of the Fire God — Turning out for a Sedan chair — Close 
Quarters — A City of Temples — Streets with Odd Names — ' ' Lon- 
gevity Lane " — " Heavenly Peace Street " — A Changing Panorama — 
Outrageous Odors — A Pestilential Place without Pestilence — A Puz- 
zle for our Doctors — People who Never Heard of a Plumber — The 
Live Fish Market — Candy Stands — How Much can you Buy for a 
Cash? — Going to Market in Corea — A Royal Present — Juvenile 
Curiosity — That Little "Foreign Devil" — The Cat and Dog Meat 
Store — The Original of the Willow Pattern — The Five Hundred 
Buddhists — Marco Polo among the Gods — Lugubrious Buddhist 
Priests — Worshiping the Gods of Good Luck and Prosperity — 
Business-like Methods of Worship — The Temple of Horrors — A 



CONTENTS. XXV 

Necklace of Extracted Teeth — Some of the Tortures — Sawing a 
Man in Two — Boiled in Oil — Punishments of the Buddhist Hell — 
The Examination Hall — A Pathetic Spectacle, 164 



CHAPTER X. 

OUR JOURNEY UP THE GREAT RIVER— THE DAILY LIFE 
OF A CHINAMAN IN HIS OWN COUNTRY — FAVORITE 
FOOD AND QUEER DISHES. 

An Excursion in a Flower Boat — ' ' Rice Power " — The Stern-Wheeler 
and its Motive Power — Sacrifices and Perils of the Missionary — A 
Chinese Feast. — Chop Sticks and How to Use Them — Lamb and Chest- 
nuts — Frogs' Legs and Onions — A Dissipated Prejudice — Shrimps' 
and Bamboo Root — Our Seventeen Courses — A Chinese Village — A 
Village School and Schoolmaster — Studying Aloud — A Pot and its 
Contents — How the Ashes of Grandfathers are saved in China — " Fe, 
Fi, Fo, Fum, I Smell the Blood of a Chinaman" — Seventeen Dollars 
for a Child — A Fire-Cracker Factory — How Fire-Crackers are Made 
— Cheap Wages and Cheap Living — A Chinese Flower Garden — A 
Mandarin in His Blossom Gown — A Chinese Temple — Waking up 
the God — Washstands for a God — Lack of Reverence — Fans for Sick 
Relatives — The Voices of the Night — A Contrast, 179 



CHAPTER XL 

OUR STAY IN CHARMING JAPAN — SOCIAL CUSTOMS — SOME 
INTERESTING PERSONAL EXPERIENCES — LIFE AND 
SCENES ON A TEA PLANTATION. 

The Best Preparation for a New Land — A Terrible Typhoon — Personal 
Experiences — "The Lord is Able to Give Thee Much More Than 
This" — The Most Beautiful of Mountains — Fujiyama in Spotless 
Ermine — ' ' Fiery Jack " — Yokohama — The Rush of Jinrikishas — 
The Capture of the Man-of- War's Men — Fun in the Custom House — 
" Crossing the Palm" — A Lesson in Japanese Politeness — Bowing in 
Japanese — The Shop-keeper's Salaam — The Maid Servant's Obeisance 
Receiving Callers — A Hinge in the Spine — The Ohio Statesman's 
Mistake — "My Fool of a Wife" — Japanese Railways — Our Fellow 
Passengers — Progressive Japan — Telegraph Lines and Electric Lights 
— Postal Delivery Six Times a Day — Protecting the Windows — The 
Professor's Many Suits — The " Obi" — A Japanese Joseph — What we 
Saw from the Car Window — A Tea Plantation — ' ' Father's Pride and 
Mother's Joy " — Thatch-Roofed Farm Houses, 191 



XXVI CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XII. 

A STROLL AMONG THE MIKADO'S SUBJECTS —EVERYDAY 
LIFE IN A JAPANESE HOUSE. 

Tokio, its Parks, its Temples, and its Palace — Its University — A Study 
of Fish Parasites — What Missionaries have done — The Seismological 
Department — An Artificial Earthquake — Exceptional Earthquake 
Privileges — Wheat and Chaff — Canton and Tokio, or China versus 
Japan — The Frenchman of the East — A Japanese House — No Doors, 
No Windows, No Chimneys — A Walk in a Country Village — The 
Country Bakery — A Rice Mill — Division of Labor — An Initiation into 
the Art of Orange Eating — The Japanese Shoe Shop — The Villainous 
Daikon — Prices in Japan — A Pot of Tea for Two Cents — A Japanese 
Dinner in a Japanese Hotel — The Curious Crowds at the Window — 
The Motormen of the East — The Hilarious Jinrikisha Men — The 
Waitress and her Odd Position — Paying our Reckoning, . . . 206 

CHAPTER XIII. 

OUR EXPERIENCE AT A CEREMONIAL TEA — JAPANESE 
SOCIAL LIFE — IN THE EMPEROR'S PALACE. 

A Ceremonial Tea — "Past Masters " of Politeness — The Emperor's De- 
vice — A Dignified Function — A Contest in Politeness — White and 
Black Charcoal — With Measured Steps and Rhythmic Motion — Build- 
ing the Fire — The Most Solemn Moment — Our Part in the Ceremony 

— No Laughing Matter — Smacking Our Lips — From Tokio to Kioto 

— The Garden of the World — Industrious and Careful Farmers — 
Woman's Rights in Japan — One of Japan's Honored Names — Mis- 
sionary Life in the East — Flippant "Globe-trotters" — Cheating the 
Gods — Stone Children with Red Bibs — Conf ucius's Chilly Cult — The 
Temple of the Three Thousand Gods — Big Gods and Little Gods — 
Rope Made of Human Hair — How Heavy Timbers were Lifted into 
Place — Curious Sacrifice of Religious Devotees — In the Emperor's 
Palace — Osaka, its Mint, its Castle, and its Fish-Market, . . . 230 

CHAPTER XIV. 

OUR RETURN TO CHINA— THE SEAMY SIDE OF CHINESE 
LIFE — OPIUM FIENDS AND FAN-TAN GAMBLERS — ODD 
WAYS OF AN ODD PEOPLE — CURIOUS DISPOSAL OF 
THE DEAD. 

An Obstructing Bar — The Will of Heaven — Almond Eyes and Pigtails 

— Noiseless John — How John Chinaman Treats Americans in Shanghai 

— Colossal Conceit — The Future of the Celestial Empire — Shoes Two 
Cents a Pair — A Chinese Grocery Store — Dried Kidneys and Chickens' 



CONTENTS. XXV11 

Livers — Varnished Pig — Allowable Theft — A Chinese Rice Mill — 
Arrested Development — How Chinese Paper is Made — Rice Paper — 
How it is Produced — Woe-begone, Emaciated Faces — The Seamy Side 
of Chinese Life — " Hitting the Pipe " — Opium Fiends — Fan-tan Gam- 
blers — Intense Excitement — Chinese Music — Unearthly Screeching — 
Prolonged and Awful Caterwauling — In the Suburbs — Human Beasts 
of Burden — China and Japan Agriculturally Considered — Rotation of 
Crops — Novel Ice Harvesting — Fish Farming — An Odd Way of Fish- 
ing — The Old, Old Story of Mortality — A Great Funeral — Funeral 
Baked Meats — Baby Towers of Shanghai, 257 

CHAPTEE XV, 

A JOURNEY THROUGH TROPIC SEAS — ARRIVAL IN INDIA- 
NATIVE JUGGLERS, ACROBATS, AND BEGGARS. 

A Delightful Voyage — Liquid Fire — The Sacred White Ox — The Gharri 

— The "L Road" and the Bullock Bandy — Fan Palms of Singapore — 
A Tree that Casts no Shadow — How the Bandy Driver Stimulates his 
Steeds — An Effective Threat — Chewing a Bullock's Tail to make 
him go — Picturesque Wharf Venders — "Papa Dive" — Scrambling for 
Nickels — A Walk in Penang — Mangosteens and Jack-fruit — Assa- 
fcetida and Onions — The Indian Juggler — A Man with a Gizzard — 
The Mango Tree Trick and the Girl in the Basket — The Last of the 
Chinaman — Ceylon's Spicy Breezes — The Waggish Captain's Joke — 
The Odors of Colombo — A Horrible Combination — The Catamaran — 
The Two Instincts of the Singhalese — Persistent Shopkeepers — Be- 
sieged by Beggars — Baby Merchants and their Wares — The Cinna- 
mon Gardens — An Ancient Turtle — Brawny Barbarism and Miss 
Nancyism, 279 

CHAPTER XVI. 

OUR EXPERIENCES IN SOUTHERN INDIA — LIFE IN A MIS- 
SIONARY BUNGALOW — A PICNIC IN THE JUNGLE. 

A Journey with a Bad Reputation — Landing at Tuticorin — Railway 
Traveling in India — A New Use for a Dirty Sock — Preparing for Hot 
Weather — House Building in the Tropics — " Give the Sun no Chance " 

— Horses under Pith Hats — Barren India — On the Ragged Edge of 
Famine — Gaunt Starvation — Disputing with the Ants — Buffaloes- 
and Long-legged Goats — A Sunset Scene — A Missionary Bungalow — 
A Girls' Boarding School — How They Make up Their Beds — An In- 
ventory of a Maiden's Jewels — A Missionary's Manifold Labors — A 
Picnic in the Jungle — The "Nine Lac Garden" — Serious Duties 
Again — A Bicycle Story — The Good Devil and his Terrible Bell — 
"Tell Me Your Name, Good Devil " — Bound in the Shackles of the 
Caste System — A Brave Brahmin, 294 



XXV111 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XVII. 

SOME FAMOUS CITIES OF SOUTHERN INDIA — INDIAN 
SNAKE CHARMERS, THIEVES AND ROBBERS — FAMOUS 
IDOLS, TEMPLES AND PALACES. 

A Fascinating Land — Gorgeous Heathenism — Tattoo Marks and Sacred 
Ashes — A Man of the Thief Caste — A Robber Village — Calling the 
Roll of Thieves — The Thief Middleman — The Women at the Well — 
The Greasy Fakir — Paying Him for Drifting to Leeward — Blood- 
curdling Announcements — A Magnificent Temple — Twenty -five Mill- 
ions of Dollars — Dusty Gods and Goddesses — The Holy of Holies — A 
Stone Bull in a Stone Bath Tub — The God's Bath — A Beautiful Pal- 
ace — The Temple, of Tan j are — Filthy Water as a Purifier of Sins — 
The Last Rajah and His Wives — A Wedding Procession — The Kick- 
ing Capacities of an Old Smooth-Bore — Vellore and its Temple — Sus- 
pense and Terror — A Brave Rescue — The Gallant Horses — Tippoo 
Sahib's Relatives — The Madras Hunt — The Punkah Wallah, . 311 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

ON THE BANKS OF THE SACRED GANGES — HORRIBLE CUS- 
TOMS—FUNERAL RITES AND WEDDING CEREMONIES. 

The Mouth of the Hoogly — A Precaution — From the Parisian to the 
Pariah — The Great Banyan of the Geographies — Ten Thousand 
Troops under its Shade — The Burning Ghat — A Sidewalk Barber's 
Shop — A Ghastly Group — Innumerable Beggars — Religious Parasites 

— The Old Fakir's Offering — The Bathers in the Ganges — A Devoted 
Son — Dying at her Leisure — A Burning Ghat — Decorations after the 
Bath — Burning the Dead — Hindu Theology — Towers of Silence — 
Dreary Biers and Hungry Vultures — A Cannibal Feast — The Jews of 
India — Why They Give their Bodies to the Vultures — The Bondage of 
Caste — Paying Dear for his Dinners — A Venerable Bridegroom — 
Match Makers in India — The Stars Favorable and Marriages Frequent 

— A Wedding Procession — A Pathetic Mite of a Bride — A Matter-of- 
fact Wooer, 335 

CHAPTER XIX. 

IN THE COUNTRY OF THE GREAT MUTINY — SOME PAGES 
OF BLOODY HISTORY — HEROES AND HEROINES OF 
INDIA — MEMORIES OF THE PAST. 

Across Northern India by Rail — In an Indian Sleeping Car — Scenes from 
our Car Window — Storks and Penguins, Monkeys and Jackals — "It 
is a Beautiful Morning ; Come, Let Us Kill Something " — Defiling a 



CONTENTS. XXIX 

Peddler's Sweetmeats — A Work of Patience and Diplomacy — An 
Every Day Conversation in India — The Mecca of the Brahmins — The 
Monkey Temple — Cawnpore of Bloody Memory — An Awful Page of 
History — The Angel of Remembrance — Memories of Lucknow — 
The Gallant Lawrence — Havelock's Troops to the Rescue — The 
Hero's Grave — The Cannon Ball that Robbed the Mother of Her Babe 

— The City of the Taj Mahal — The Mogul's Promise and How He 
Kept It — "In Memory of an Immortal Love" — The Hand of the 
Vandal — "Jane Higginbottom " in the Taj — How the Old King 
Played Parchesi, 353 

CHAPTER XX. 

OUR VOYAGE ACROSS THE INDIAN OCEAN AND THROUGH 
THE- SUEZ CANAL — ARRIVAL IN EGYPT. 

Some of our Fellow Passengers — Missionaries and Men of Mars — The 
Little Athletes — Potato Races and Hurdle Jumping — The Red Sea — 
A Glimpse of Sinai — "And a Half, Eight" — Waiting our Turn — A 
Huge Jack o' Lantern — A Sight Long to be Remembered — A Stu- 
pendous Enterprise — A Great Waterway — Canal Diggers before De 
Lesseps — In the Canal — Ismalia and her Donkeys — ' ' Yankee Doodle " 
and "Washy Washington" — Undeniable Desert — A Woman with a 
Supplementary Nose — Our First Glimpse of the Bedouin — A Family 
of Arabs — The Land of Goshen — Pharaoh and his Prime Minister — 
Bricks without Straw — The Fellahin and How They Live — Their 
Superstitions — " O, Virgin Mary" — "The Sun Do Move" — The 
Blessings'Brought by John Bull — A' Ghostly Reminder — How They 
Carry the Babies — "Backsheesh, Backsheesh" — "Oh Sugar for a 
Nail"— "God Will Make Them Light, Oh Lemons" — The Little 
"Sons of the River," 370 

CHAPTER XXI. 

IN THE LAND OF THE PHARAOHS — THE MOST WONDER- 
FUL MUSEUM IN THE WORLD — THE MUMMY OF PHA- 
RAOH THE OPPRESSOR, AND HOW THE BODY WAS DIS- 
COVERED—LOOKING INTO PHARAOH'S FACE. 

Marvelous Cairo — A Vivacious Traveler — Eyes wanted Before and Be- 
hind — A Labyrinth of Lanes — Fashion in a Fez — Madam Grundy in 
Egypt — At the Sugar Cane Bazaar — A Glimpse of the Khedive — A 
Boy in a Fez— A Ride to Heliopolis — The Flight into Egypt — The 
Tree of the Virgin — How the Spider Outwitted Herod — Ancient On — 
The Only Relic — Joseph's Father-in-Law — Where Joseph was Married 

— How are the Mighty Fallen ! — The Most Wonderful Museum in the 
World — A Room Full of Mummies — Sethi I and Rameses II — Moses' 



XXX CONTENTS. 

Playfellow — What the Bible says of Him — A Mummy over Three 
Thousand Years Old — The Pharaoh of the Oppression — Where He 
was Buried — The Location a Mighty Secret for Centuries — How the 
Tomb was Discovered in 1881 — Unwinding the Mummy — How 
Pharaoh Looked — Description of the Body — Its Identity Established 
— Where is the Pharaoh of the Exodus '? 390 



CHAPTEK XXII. 

ON THE BANKS OF THE NILE — OUR CLIMB TO THE TOP 
OF THE GREAT PYRAMIDS — BESET BY ARABS — AMUS- 
ING ADVENTURES AND EXPERIENCES. 

An Ancient Proverb — Our First View of the Pyramids — Man-made 
Mountains — Monuments Which Never Disappoint the Traveler — 
Could They be Built To-day ? — A Blow at the Conceit of the Nine- 
teenth Century — Comfort for the Optimist — Why the Pyramids were 
Built and How — The Tombs of the Pharaohs — A Small Pyramid for a 
Short Reign — A More Intimate Acquaintance — The Road to Cheops- 
— "Mafish Backsheesh" — Unnecessary Attention — The Comanches of 
the Desert — An Appeal to the Sheik — Getting Up-stairs — How the 
Stout Lady Reached the Top — Desolation, .Dearth, and Death — Life- 
giving Father Nile — Beautiful Cairo — An Ancient Story of the Pyra- 
mids — Avaricious Arabs — Destroying the Pyramids — Looking Down 
on Forty Centuries — A Ride on a Camel to the Sphinx — Boarding 
the Ship of the Desert — The Ever-watchful One, 417 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

ALL ABOARD FOR JERUSALEM — JOURNEYING THROUGH 
THE HOLY LAND BEHIND A LOCOMOTIVE— SCENES AND 
INCIDENTS BY THE WAY. 

A Stormy Day in March — A Test for Brave Hearts and Strong Stom- 
achs — Throwing Up Jonah — Going Ashore at Jaffa — How We Got 
Down the Ship's Side — Dumping Passengers in the Small Boat — Up 
to the Ridge Pole and Down the Side of the Great Tent — A Terrible 
Accident — A Highwayman's Demand — " Your Money or Your Life" 
— A Near Approach — Unspeakable Filth — The House of Simon the 
Tanner — Simon's Vat — View from the Housetop — Our Rural Friend 
from New York State — "Them Jimkirridges " — Through the Holy 
Land Behind a Steam Engine — The Sentimental Man — The Reward of 
Indulging a Sentiment — Our Dragoman — How Abdallah Caught the 
Doctors Napping — When the Sun and the Moon Stood Still — The 
Dapper Conductor in His Red Fez — The Rose of Sharon, . . . 435- 



CONTENTS. XXXI 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

"JERUSALEM, JERUSALEM"— OUR SOJOURN IN THE LAND* 
OF SACRED STORY -INTERESTING SCENES AND TOUCH- 
ING MEMORIES. 

The Brakeman's Announcement — Incongruous Modernism — Entering 
Jerusalem — Thronging Emotions — " The Joy of the Whole Earth " — 
A Walk within the Walls — The Modern City — A Pathetic Story — 
Plunging into the Heart of the City — The Various Shops — Silverware 
from Damascus — Shy lock in Jerusalem — A Suggestion of White-Caps 
— The Camel and His Sneering Underlip — Water-Carriers and their Goat 
Skins — The Dignified Syrian — The Church of the Holy Sepulchre — 
A Checkered History — The Short Triumph of the Crusaders — The 
Stone of Unction — A Touching Bible Story — Vulgar Facts — Measur- 
ing the Stone for Their Winding Sheet — Our Lord's Tomb — The Great 
Unwashed — How Adam Came to Life — The Cleft in the Rock — An 
Impressive Spectacle — A Disgraceful Easter Scene — '■ An Awful Acci- 
dent, 447 

CHAPTER XXV. 

FOLLOWING IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF OUR LORD — A MEMOR- 
ABLE WALK — LIFE AND SCENES IN THE HOLY CITY. 

The Via Dolorosa — Fourteen Stations on the Way to the Cross — St. Veron- 
ica and "Her Handkerchief — Some Touching Inscriptions — Outside the 
Gates — Our Golgotha — " The Green Hill Far Away." — Gethsemane — 
The Stone of Treason — A Wonderful View — Our Lord's Broken- 
Hearted Lament — The Russian Tower — The Dead Sea — A Marvelous 
Mirror — Absalom's Tomb — The Fate of an Unfilial Reprobate — The 
cave of Adullam — Nebo and Its Lonely Grave — The Village of Mary and 
Martha — The Greatest Miracle of the Ages — " Dis Way to de Tomb 
of Lazaroos " — The Wretched Inhabitants of Modern Bethany — The 
Tomb of Rachel — Where Our Lord was Born — The Marble Cradle — 
An Impressive Sight — Wrangling Christians — Turkish Guards at Our 
Lord's Cradle — A Sad Suggestion, 469 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

WITHIN AND AROUND " THE DOME OF THE ROCK"— CURIOUS 
TRADITIONS AND PATHETIC SCENES. 

The Mosque of Omar — A Rock of Wonderful Traditions — Abraham's 
Sacrifice — Our Retinue — Mohammed's Broomstick Ride — The Wily 
Jew and the Pilgrim — The Wise Judge — The Marvelous Iron Chain 



XXX11 CONTENTS. 

of Justice — A Wily Jew — Our Slippers and How We Kept Them On 
— Our "Humbug" Sheik — The Great Rock — The Stone of Kails — 
How the Devil Drew Them Out — An Easy Way of Buying Heaven — 
A Rock Which Rests on Nothing — How Gabriel Held It Down — The 
Way to Paradise — What the Pilgrim Found in the Well — Hairs from 
the Beard of Mohammed — The Stables of Solomon — The Place of 
Final Judgment — Startling and Curious Traditions — The Wailing 
Place — Real Grief — A Squalid Scene — The Old Pharisee and His 
Lovelocks — A Sad Litany — A More Joyful Keynote — A Marvelous 
Race, 488 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

IN THE HOME OF SAINT PAUL — THE FAMOUS CEDARS OF 
LEBANON — OUR EXPERIENCES IN THE LAND OF THE 
SULTAN — AT THE MERCY OF INHOSPITABLE TURKS. 

Embarking at Jaffa — Americans in Syria — Their Splendid College — An 
Interesting Room — The Beginning of Our Tribulations — A Turkish 
Custom House — Forbidden Words — The Sapient Censor — A School 
Boy's Composition and What Came of it — The Use of Ironclads 
— An Ill-Starred Rebellion — " No Mean City" — St. Paul's Well — 
Drawing Water from It — St. Paul's Tree — St. Paul's Institute — 
Humble Streets — A Walk to the Vali's Palace — "Palace" or 
"Sheds"? — In the Presence of His Excellency — "The Bouyou- 
rouldou " — Official Handwriting — A Sunday in Adana — A Living 
Screen — A Congregation of Fezzes — Squatting on the Floor — How to 
Pack a Congregation — Turks and Armenians — "Is America on a 
Hill ? " — Preparing for our Overland Journey, 504 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

A REMARKABLE JOURNEY ACROSS ASIA MINOR IN A SPRING 
WAGON — THRILLING EXPERIENCES BY THE WAY — A 
DANGEROUS RIDE. 

An Imposing Cavalcade — Foolish "Franks" — An Arsenal of Archaic 
Weapons — Ali, the Turk — Anastas, the Errand Boy — "Meat" — 
Entrancing Scenery — Snow-capped Lebanon — The Road of Paul and 
Cicero — Eloquent Ruins — Our Fellow Travelers — Caravans of Cam- 
els — The Patient Donkey — Pleasant Salutations — " Bereket Versin " — 
"May the Almighty Cling to your Hand" — The Motto of the Spoons 

— The Story of the Dervish — The Holy Ass — A Chip of the Old Block 

— Keeping Off the " Evil Eye " — " You Dirty Brat " — A Fond Moth- 
er's Salutation — The Mother-in-Law in Turkey — A Typical Turkish 



CONTENTS. XXX111 

Khan — Sharing a Bed with the Camels — Through the Cilician Gates 
— The "Bad Five Miles" — How We Held the Wagon Crossing the 
Taurus Mountains — In the Guest Room of Selim, 525 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

ON TO THE GOLDEN HORN — CONTINUATION OF OUR JOUR- 
NEY IN A WAGON — WHIRLING AND HOWLING DER- 
VISHES—VEILED WOMEN OF TURKEY. 

Watched by a Curious Crowd — A Broken-Hearted Wife — The Lamp- 
Dealer's Suspicious Balls — A Genuine Turkish Bath — The Feast of 
Ramidan — Waking Up to Eat — The Difference Between a Black 
Thread and a White — Cross Officials — A Picked and Singed Turkey 

— Carving Up Turkey — Angora Cats and Angora Goats — Tying Up 
a Railway Train — Drawing Near to Constantinople — A Famous 
College — St. Sophia, the Marvelous — In the Hands of the Vandals 

— The Covered Face — The Bloody Hand of the Conqueror — The 
" Sweating Column " — The Whirling Dervishes — How They Whirl — 
Treading on the Babies — A Strange Ceremony — How the Sultan Goes 
to Mosque — Sanding the Road — A Mean-Faced Monarch — The Sultan's 
Wives and Daughters — A Timid Tyrant — Rich Stores of Costly 
Jewels — Beautiful Broussa — Tomb of Othman the Great, . . 545 



CHAPTER XXX. 

THROUGH CLASSIC LANDS— FROM CONSTANTINOPLE TO 
THE COAST OF SPAIN — UNDER BLUE ITALIAN SKIES — 
ALONG OLD PATHS —HOMEWARD BOUND. 

Off for Athens — On the TcMckatclioff — The Occident and the Orient — 
The Sharp Line of Demarcation — Tenedos and Its Wooden Horse — 
AVhat Makes Athens Great To-day? — A Charming Journey — The 
Ruined City and its Thrilling Story — The Romantic Way of Climbing 
Vesuvius — The Lake of Fire and Brimstone — An Awful Accident 
— Where the Christians Fought with Wild Beasts — Pisa and its Bell 
Tower — The Campo Santo and its Sacred Soil — Lazy Venice and its 
Gondolas — Genoa the Superb — All that We Found of Columbus — On 
the Borders of Spain — A Royal Swimmer — Ambitious Spanish Girls — 
Too Envious to be Courteous — A Memory of Lafayette — Washer- 
women Object to Modern Conveniences, 568 



XXXIV 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

OBJECTS AND RESULTS OF OUR JOURNEY — THE FAVORING 
HAND OF PROVIDENCE — LOOKING BACKWARD — HAPPY 
MEMORIES. 

The Great Object of our Journey — Australian Conventions — Unbounded 
Enthusiasm — The Y. P. S. C. E. Pennant — Happy Memories — In 
Marvelous Japan — A " United Society " for China — Among the Hin- 
dus — Obstacles in Turkey — Forbidden Words — Arresting St. Paul 

— Black-Eyed Spanish Endeavorers — Encouragement in Paris — Good 
News from the Mother Land — Steady Growth of Endeavor Societies — 
Impressions of Missionaries and Their Work — Cruel Misrepresentations 

— Globe Trotters' Slanders — A Diversity of Gifts — AVhat are the 
Hardships of a Missionary to-day? — The Most Hopeful Feature of Mod- 
ern Civilization — The Anglo-Saxon Missionary and His Noble Work — 
.Saving the World through Jesus Christ, 582 




B6 Seen ftbrougb a TKHoman's TEves. 



Q/WV2A/ & 




CHAPTER I. 

A WOMAN'S LIFE AT SEA — HOUSEKEEPING IN A FLOATING 
PRISON — LIFE UNDER THE SOUTHERN CROSS. 

At Sea — Housekeeping on a Small Scale — Daily Life in a Floating 
Prison — A Consoling Stewardess — Tea and Toast in a Stateroom — 
A Bed that Never Kept Still — Lucid Intervals — Moving into a New 
Home — Arranging our Belongings — Going to Housekeeping Eighteen 
Times in One Year — The Back Yard of an Ocean Steamer — Sighing for 
a Pine Stump — A Chinese Steward, A Malay Quartermaster, and an 
English Captain — Life on the Chingtn — Under the Southern Cross — 
A Velvet-footed Steward — Doleful verms Pleasant Memories, . . 592 



CONTENTS. XXXV 

CHAPTER II. 

AMONG THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN OF JAPAN — A JAPAN- 
ESE PRAYER MEETING — NATIVE POLITENESS AND ETI- 
QUETTE—MY EXPERIENCE WITH CHOPSTICKS. 

■Compensations — The Brown Babies of India — The Yellow Babies of 
Japan — Queensland Lucy — A Forlorn Little Black Girl — The Hottest 
Place on Earth — Home Life in Japan — Going to Prayer Meeting in a 
Jinrikisha — A Shuffling, Awkward Gait — Where We Left Our Shoes 

— Japanese Etiquette — A Cordial Welcome — Bowing to the Floor 

— " Rock of Ages " in Japanese — An Interesting Meeting — Struggling 
with a Foreign Language — ' ' Sayonara " to our Friends — Japanese 
Refreshments — Eating Bean Soup with Chopsticks — A Difficult 
Operation — Drinking Soup from a Bowl — Delusive Beans — New Use 
for a Sleeve — A Japanese Pillow — The Professor of Flowers. — 
Artistic Bouquets, 603 

CHAPTER III. 

AMONG THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN OF INDIA — NATIVE 
DRESS AND ORNAMENTS — LIFE INSIDE A RICH HEATH- 
EN HOME — HEATHEN DOLLS, BRIDES, AND WIDOWS. 

Children in Ceylon — Persistent Little Beggars — Curly-Headed Karo — 
' ' My so Poor " — Pretty Brown Babies — Little Hands Stretched out 
for Alms — Ceylon Dandies — Picturesque Waiters — A Race of Beg- 
gars — Tipping an Army of Attendants — Starting on a Journey at 
Three o'clock in the Morning — A Wagon Ride of Seven Miles in the 
Moonlight — Through the Streets of Vellore — Arrival at a Mission 
Bungalow — A Native Girl's Boarding School — A Bridal Trousseau in 
Red and Yellow — Life Inside a Heathen Home — Our Reception by the 
"Bo" — A Peep into the "Baboo's" Apartments — A Display of 
Jewelry — An American Doll in India — A Heathen Doll — Mrs. Grundy 
in a Zenana — Ten- Year-Old Brides — Child Widows 616 



CHAPTER IV. 

A WOMAN'S JOURNEY ACROSS TURKEY IN A WAGON — A 
MEMORABLE NIGHT IN A TURKISH KHAN — TURKISH 
VILLAGE LIFE — INTERESTING PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 

Learning by Experience — My Traveling Companions — "Coming out 
Strong " — Mark Tapley's Opinion of the Sea — Our First Experiences in 
a Turkish Custom House — Searching for Concealed Books and Papers 



XXXVI 



CONTENTS. 



— A Novel Cavalcade — In a Turkish Khan — A Memorable Night — 
Rooming with Donkeys, Camels, and Horses — Our Wash Basin — 
Over the Taurus Mountains — An American Spring Wagon in Asia 
Minor — A Dismal Prospect — Filth and Dirt Everywhere — Sickening 
Sights in Village Streets — Hobson's Choice — In a Native House — 
Putting an Armenian Baby to Bed — A Cheerful Infant — A Peep into 
Paradise — Dirty Turks — Eating out of the Same Dish with Them — 
A Plague of Fleas — Some Pointed Questions, 625 



CHAPTER V. 

GOOD-BYE. 
"GOD BE WITH YOU TILL WE MEET AGAIN." 

The Departure from San Francisco — The Crowded Wharf — "All Ashore 
that's Going Ashore" — The Song of Farewell — The Captain's Encour- 
agement — Good Cheer for All — A Never-to-be-forgotten Song — In 
Moreton Bay — On Board the GJiingtu — Our Friends on the Launch — 
Chattering Chinese — A Voice from the Tarshaw — An TJnappreciative 
Listener — Another Precious Memory — At a Railway Station in Oka- 
yama — Japanese Courtesy — The Train Waits for the Song — In a 
Chinese Schoolroom — The Lively Little Junior — The Dear Old Hymn 
in Chinese — In a Little Hill Town of India — Departure in the Early 
Morning — Surrounded by Ghosts — "God Be With You " in Hindu 
Dialect — A Brown -faced Boy Choir — Sweet, Lingering Echoes — A 
Blessed Memory of Friends in Distant Lands, 636 





CHAPTER I. 

OUR START — LIFE ON AN OCEAN STEAMER. 

The Journey Begun — Daily Life on an Ocean Steamer — Always Journey- 
ing Homeward — Who is "We" — Taking the Reader into our Con- 
fidence — A Parting Look — ' ' God be with You till We Meet Again " 

— The "Mariposa" — Our Fellow Passengers — Gambling on Ship- 
board — Betting on the Day's Run — Where to read "Penny Dread- 
fuls " — Lord Blank and his Guardian — One Day on a Pacific Steamer 

— A Flexible Bath-tub — Something of which there is Enough — At 
the Dinner Table — Sighing for Home-made Bread and Butter — 
Wanted, Milk from a Cow instead of from a Tin Can — Mrs. Bostonese 
Brains — The Tramp, tramp, tramp of the Passengers — Ring-Toss and 
Shuffle-Board — Sunday on the Ocean. 




HE traveler on his way around 
the world is always journeying 
homeward. Every revolution 
of the car wheels, every vibra- 
tion of the steamer's propeller 
brings him nearer to the point 
of his departure. He has no 
1 weary miles of sea or land to 
retrace. "When deserts daunt 
his spirits, and dreary Avastes of 
interminable, tumbling waves 
oppress the very imagination, 
as they are sure to do before his journey ends, he can say 
to himself: "I shall not go this way again. I have but 
to keep on and the desired home haven will be reached." 
I assure my readers that before the wide open doors of 
3 (37) 



38 "personally conducted." 

the Golden Gate had been left many days in the distance, 
we had reason to summon all our philosophy and to extract 
all the sunshine which we could obtain from such sentimen- 
tal cucumbers ; for, to make the best of it, there are, on such 
a journey as this book relates, monotonous days and home- 
sick (not to say seasick) hours, and discomforts in abun- 
dance, to offset the new experiences, novel sensations, and 
charming memory pictures which such a journey also affords. 
But it shall be my object on this "personally conducted" 
trip which I invite my readers to take with me, to elimi- 
nate from their journey just as many of these disagreeable 
and monotonous features as possible, and to give them the 
pleasures, of travel without its discomforts; as many roses 
and as few thorns as may be in my power to pluck. 

The preface tells the reader of the chief object of this 
journey ; and the purpose of this book is to take my friends 
with me over sea and land and show them the objects and 
the people, the customs and the manners, the homes, streets, 
and native life that most interested me. How often have 
I wished that these friends were with me as I have silently 
called the roll of their names — hundreds and thousands 
of them ; that some fabulously rich Count of Monte Cristo 
might put a steamer or a whole fleet of steamers at our 
disposal so that we could make the journey together. But 
since that could not be, we will go together in the pages of 
this volume if they will kindly follow me. 

We started — but where shall I say we started ? From 
Boston, where our trunks were first checked, or from Jersey 
City, where hundreds of generous friends from New Jerse}?" 
and ISTew York and Brooklyn gave us occasion to remember 
the parting scene as long as we live ; or from Chicago, 
where equally warm welcomes and warm farewells were 
extended ; or from Denver, or Salt Lake City, or Santa 



WHO IS "WE." 39 

Cruz, or San Jose, or Oakland, or San Francisco? If one 
starts from the place where he leaves dear friends and 
receives kind and affectionate adieus, then we started from 
all these places, and many others which it is impossible to 
mention. 

However, since the trip across the American Continent 
is a matter of daily occurrence to hundreds of travelers, and 
since I need not weary you with such a twice-told tale, we 
will start, dear reader, as, in fact, " we " actually started from 
the Golden Gate on Friday — by no means an unlucky day, 
let us hope. 

The " we " is not altogether an editorial we, but refers, 
when particular designation may be necessary, to the three 
individuals whom we will call the Pilgrim and Mrs. Pilgrim 
and the Young Pilgrim, whose personality is explained a 
little more fully in the preface. 

This book is not to be a journal of what these pilgrims 
did and said and how they felt and what kind of weather 
they experienced, and how many times they paid tribute to 
Neptune, and so forth. Such diaries are apt to become 
egotistical and wearisome; but this shall be made up of 
experiences and pictures which Ave would have live in your 
memories and ours. 

It matters comparatively little whether the Pilgrim had 
a fit of indigestion on the 20th of September, or whether 
Mrs. Pilgrim had an attack of the blues (as though such a 
thing were possible) on the 25th of November, or whether 
the young Pilgrim caught the measles from a too close 
inspection of the steerage ; such facts may have appropriate 
place in a private diary, but only old Samuel Pepys could 
make them interesting to other people. 

But we shall take you all into our confidence in regard 
to matters of common interest. We will, in other words, 



40 FAREWELL TO THE GOLDEN WEST. 

look for you through the most powerful field-glasses we can 
command, at everything high and low, commonplace and 
extraordinary, which Ave think would interest } r ou. We will 
not merely gaze at the sun, moon, and stars, the lofty moun- 
tain peaks, and sublime characters which come within our 
range. "We will look for you at the common people and 
their common ways ; at the little street gamin as well as the 
lords and ladies of high degree ; at the trivial things which 
many travelers think beneath their notice ; and especially 
at the unusual and the uncommon which it is necessary to 
travel ten thousand leagues of sea and land to view. 

Now that we understand each other so fully, dear read- 
ers, let us take a parting look at " the land of the free and 
the home of the brave," which we shall not see again for 
nearly a twelvemonth. 

The steamship Mariposa is moving away from her 
San Francisco pier. The fluttering white handkerchiefs of 
the crowd of Californian Endeavorers on the dock, whose 
welcome has partaken of all the unbounded hospitality of 
the Golden West, are growing dimmer every moment, their 
" God be with } T ou till we meet again " sounds fainter and 
fainter, until at last they are lost to eye and ear, and with a 
lump in our throats at the thought of the land and friends 
Ave are leaving behind us, Ave turn to look at the good ship 
which for nearly a month is to be our home, and at the 
passengers Avho are to be our neighbors. 

Not a matter of small moment is this of home and neigh- 
bors on such a A T oyage as that from San Francisco to Syd- 
ney. On a little run of five or six days on an ocean grey- 
hound across the Atlantic, it matters little, comparatively, 
Avhat are one's surroundings. One can misanthropically 
take to his berth or shut himself up in his stateroom for 
such a journey ; but Avhen it comes to the magnificent dis- 



GAMBLING ON SHIPBOARD. 41 

tances of the Pacific it is quite a different thing, and one 
feels almost as much interest in his surroundings as a minis- 
ter in his new parish or a freshman in his new classmates. 

All modern ocean steamers for passenger travel have 
many things in common ; they are all long and narrow, with 
staterooms and dining saloon below, and a promenade deck 
or social hall above. The Pacific liners, especially those for 
the Australian ports, are built more for hot weather than 
the Atlantic fleet, with the most desirable staterooms on 
the upper deck, and with awnings to keep off the sun which 
on the North Atlantic is always more agreeable than other- 
wise. 

But let us look at our fellow passengers. As all Gaul 
was divided into three parts, so all the passengers on an 
ocean steamer may be divided into two parts ; the gamblers 
and the non-gamblers. I am sorry to say that on our steamer 
the former outnumber the latter. Not that they are pro- 
fessional gamblers for the most part ; they would be shocked 
at any such remote suggestion, but they help make up " the 
pool," take a chance in the " Calcutta Sweep," and eagerly 
scan the record of the ship's run each day to see whether 
they have lost or won. 

The moral sense, on the matter of gambling at least, 
seems to be blunted on shipboard ; the sea air has a demoral- 
izing effect on the finer sensibilities. There is Lord , 

for instance, who looks like a green country youth from the 
backwoods of America, only that his clothes do not fit so 
well as the average cowboy's fit him. One would think, to 
look at his innocent face, that no guile lurked behind it, but 
he spends day after day in the reeking atmosphere of the 
smoking room, with his pile of money and " chips " before 
him, as eager over the cards as though his life depended on 
them. There, too, is Sir , a great man in his own 



42 REVELATIONS OF CHARACTER. 

land, I understand, who, doubtless, poses every year at elec- 
tion time as a model of all the virtues, and an example to 
all the youth. He can find nothing better to do than to bet 
on every day's run, and to abet the young lord whose tem- 
porary guardian he is, and before whom he should set a 
good example, in all his gambling operations. There, too, 
is Mrs. — — , who doubtless, considers herself a perfect 
lady. Alas, I believe the register says she is from Boston ! 
She is eagerness itself to know whether her little venture in 
the Calcutta Sweep is like to yield her any dividends. 

But there are some, I am glad to say, who have as much 
principle on sea as on land; who are not tempted to lay 
aside their ordinary morals because of the comparative 
seclusion of an ocean steamer. 

The fact is, a voyage of this sort brings out and accent- 
uates the traits which on shore are covered up by the 
conventionalities of life. An ocean trip is a kind of a 
judgment day in its revelation of character. In this little 
company of a few score of people is a little world with all 
the hopes, fears, joys, and ambitions of the larger world 
from which we have come. The gambler at heart, who on 
shore has not a chance because of public opinion to risk a 
nickel or turn up a card, is here a gambler in reality ; the 
tippler, who at home seldom takes a drink, here without any 
reproach can have his bottle at every meal as well as be- 
tween meals ; the impatient mother (we almost always find 
one such) here has little to do save to scold her unfortunate 
babies ; the devoted lover can hold his sweetheart's hand all 
day long; the flashy novel reader, with no bread and butter 
to earn, can peruse his " penny dreadfuls " from morning to 
night. 

The real lady and gentleman, I am glad to say, are also 
on board, and their kindness and unassuming unselfishness 



IN THE EARLY MORNING. 43 

are also accentuated as they show us how, amid the trying 
circumstances of life on shipboard, true courtesy can exist. 

Perhaps jou would like to know how we pass the day. 
Sed uno disce omnes (from one learn all) is a Roman proverb 
which applies particularly to life on a Pacific Ocean steamer,, 
where the monotony of daily life is scarcely ever broken 
even by the unwelcome advent of a storrn. Bright skies, 
brisk but not violent trade winds, dancing white caps, and a 
perpetual, long, nauseating swell, are the characteristics of 
sea and sky, and one day is as much like another in all out- 
ward aspects as the proverbial two peas in a pod. 

Before daylight we hear the deck hands washing off the 
decks, for scrupulous neatness is one of the virtues of these 
ocean steamers, then we know that there is time only to> 
stretch and yawn and coquette with Morpheus for a little 
while before rising-, for the earlv morning hours in these 
tropical latitudes are the choicest of the day and we would 
make the most of them. 

At six will come the salt water plunge. A huge canvas 
bath tub is arranged on the after-deck, well screened from 
eyes polite by sail cloths ; and toward this novel bath may 
be seen stealing in the early hours certain nondescript male 
figures clad in Indian pajamas. A large hose brings the 
water in great volume straight from the briny ocean to the 
flexible bath, so that every few minutes the water is 
changed. Into this cool and wholesome tank we plunge, 
while the undulating deck continually splashes the water of 
our bath into the sea again. But there is plenty left. "We 
need not fear a famine of salt water, or be sparing of the 
refreshing fluid. If there is one thing of which there is 
enough in this world, it is the Pacific Ocean. We are glad 
to make such good use of a little of it. After the bath we 
dress for breakfast, promenade, read, write, or watch the 



44 APPALLING MONOTONY AT MEAL TIME. 

ever restless ocean, as the mood seizes us, until the gong for 
breakfast sounds. 

The meals on shipboard are much like hotel meals on 
shore ; the different steamer lines vary just as hotels vary, 
some having a good, some a bad, and some an indifferent 
cuisine; but even on the best of steamers an appalling 
monotony comes to prevail after a little. The meals seem 
to accentuate the sameness of the voyage. The fried sole 
tastes like the mullet and the mullet like the cod ; the chops 
and the steaks seem to be cut off of different sides of the 
same animal, and to have been cooked in the same frying- 
pan ; the tea and the coffee are often of the railroad eating- 
house order, and, on the whole, the less said about breakfast, 
dinner, and supper at sea the better. Let the gourmand 
and epicure beware of a long ocean voyage. Even the most 
uncomplaining man may be excused for sighing for his 
mother's home-made bread and butter, and for milk drawn 
from a cow instead of from a tin can. 

Breakfast is soon over and then the passengers, except 
those who find their pleasure in the smoking-room, stretch 
out their steamer chairs and in turn stretch themselves out 
on them, and the lazy life of a lazy day at sea begins. 

u But why do you not arouse yourselves to intellectual 
activity?" I hear Mrs. Bostonese Brains inquire. "What 
glorious hours to read! What high communion you may 
have with Shakespeare and Milton, with Dante and Goethe ! 
What rare opportunities for writing and meditation and 
communion with nature ! " " Ah, yes, my dear Mrs. Brains, 
that all sounds very well on paper, and doubtless if this 
were a work of fiction it would contain some rare passages 
concerning the intellectual activity of its traveling hero and 
heroine ; how they learned three languages by the Meister- 
schaft System and conquered the intricacies of the Integral 



LAZY LIFE AT SEA. 45 

Calculus, and became proficient in Astronomy and TJieoso- 
pky during a four weeks' voyage to Australia. But this is a 
veracious chronicle of actual fact, and, if it is not very flat- 
tering to the voyagers to say it, it must be confessed that 
there is very little stimulus to intellectual exertion on ship- 
board. Even the best sailors acknowledge this, and the 
worst are too much occupied with agonized thoughts of their 
stomachs to expend much on the cultivation of their minds. 
So, instead of finding the deck transformed into a busy hive 
of intellectual workers after breakfast, you will see a long 
line of steamer chairs, each with its lolling occupant, who 
looks as though the chief end of man was to pass away the 
time as comfortably and expeditiously as possible. 
k "Books and work and healthful play" are represented, 
however, even on shipboard; the former, it must be con- 
fessed, mostly by volumes drawn from the Mariposa's 
library, which is significantly made up, nine parts of novels 
and one part of books of travel. The "work" is repre- 
sented by the crochet and embroidery of the ladies, and 
"the play" by the two or three small boys whose natures 
seem to be the same in mid-Pacific as anywhere else. 

My young readers will like to know what games are in 
vogue on shipboard. The standard games outside of the 
smoking-room are ring-toss and shuffle-board. Ring-toss 
is too familiar to need description, but shuffle-board seems to 
belong peculiarly to the ship's deck, and furnishes excellent 
exercise for those who have some little muscle at command. 

The game requires not only considerable muscular 
power, and hence furnishes good exercise, but gives oc- 
casion for much skill in knocking the opponent out, and 
occupying the highest squares, - for the motion of the ever- 
undulating deck must be calculated, the roll to right or left 
must be considered, and a light or heavy stroke with the 



46 



GAMES UPON DECK. 



cue must be given, according as the vessel pitches backward 
or forward. 

Four usually play the game, and the implements are six 
black and six white disks of solid wood, about six inches in 
diameter and an inch thick, and four crutch-like cues or 
sticks with which to push them along the deck. A space on 
the deck is then marked off with chalk and numbered as 
follows : 

The players stand some fif- 
teen feet from this chalk-lined 
figure on the deck, place their 
disks on a line and try to 
shove them into the squares 
marked with the highest num- 
bers. The great object is to 
shove the enemy out, and land 
your own disk within the cov- 
eted square. At the end of 
each bout the whites and 
blacks reckon up their gains, 
counting only the disks that 
are wholly within the squares 
and not touching any line, and the side that obtains sixty-one 
points first is the winner. 

I do not know who the champion shuffle-board player of 
the world may be, but he deserves to have his name in- 
scribed on the immortal roll of base ball and tennis cham- 
pions, who, I suppose, have made up their minds that their 
earthly fame, at least, is secure. 

At two bells (one o'clock) usually comes lunch, and at 
four bells (six o'clock) comes dinner. These are more or less 
imposing formalities, the social customs on some steamers 
requiring evening dress for dinner. After dinner come the 





10 


ON 




8 




1 


6 


3 




5 


7 


4 




9 


2 




10 


OFF 





SHUFFLE-BOARD. 



PLEASANT EVENING HOURS. 47 

choice hours of all the day. The glaring tropical sun has 
sunk to rest, the monotonous voice of the pool auctioneer is 
stilled, the passengers become social and friendly. All 
nature is aglow ; the phosphorescent gleam appears wkere- 
ever the ship's prow parts the waves, the evening clouds 
assume fantastic shapes on the western horizon, the rosy rays 
of departing day foretell a bright to-morrow, one by one the 
southern stars come out and twinkle down upon a thousand 
dancing wavelets, which, like so many tiny mirrors, catch up 
then* broken light and send it heavenward again. 

Back and forth, back and forth, over the unsteady 
deck, tramp the passengers, taking their evening constitu- 
tionals, while the piano-girl thrums the keys inside the 
social room, which is too warm in these latitudes to 
attract many visitors. In this way the evening passes 
until bedtime comes, early or late, while the good ship 
plunges on and ever on into the darkness, and through 
the inky waves with their silver edges. Thus one of the 
prosaic twenty-five days between San Francisco and Sydney 
is numbered with the past. 

But one day of the week on sea, as on shore, is unlike 
every other. Hard as men try to secularize it, desperate as 
the efforts are to degrade it, on sea as on shore it is still 
George Herbert's : — • 

"Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright; 
Bridal of earth" and sky." 

At least, such is it to the Christian heart. Whether the sun 
shines, or the clouds lower; or the winds blow, it is still the 
Sabbath, " bridal of earth and sky." Even the inveterate 
gambler feels the difference. He dares not outrage the 
sentiment of the day by rattling his poker chips, so he puffs 
his cigar and sits around disconsolately on deck, complain- 
ing that Sunday is the dreariest day of all the week. 



48 "there was no more sea." 

The ship must plow on her way, the sailors and deck- 
hands and stewards must go through their daily routine of 
work, but even they seem to feel a different atmosphere, and 
some of them join the worshiping passengers, who, at 
eleven o'clock, assemble in the social hall for divine service. 
How different from our Sunday surroundings on shore ! 
This unsteady cabin for our sanctuary, a flag-draped shelf for 
the pulpit, a few devout souls of different nationalities, and 
creeds almost as various as the individuals, for worshipers. 
And yet there are some things that are ever the same. God 
is here. The boundless sea and infinite sk} T only seem to 
bring Him nearer. Christ is here, and " Jesus, Lover of my 
Soul," and " Rock of Ages," never sounded more sweet on 
land. The spirit of devotion is the same when accentuated 
by the solemn requiem of the sea and the ceaseless swash of 
the waves, as when borne aloft by the music of the deep- 
toned organ. 

What is the meaning of that text — " There was no more 
sea"? Some of the homesick, seasick passengers would like 
to take it literally and believe that the Revelator meant to 
state a fact in the physical geography of heaven. But with 
vision clarified by many days on the ocean wave, can we not 
see other meanings in the familiar text? The sea is a 
symbol of separation. In the fair country of which John 
wrote there will be no separation of friend from friend ; for 
"there was no more sea." 

The ocean is typical of isolation. On this long voyage 
we have not seen a single sail' for weeks on the far-off 
horizon. We have been completely shut off from all man- 
kind. The redeemed soul in heaven can never be set apart 
by himself. He is not shut up in solitary confinement. 
There is no isolation of the " Saints in Light." " There was 
no more sea." 



ISOLATION — MYSTERY — DANGER. 



49 



The sea is symbolic of mystery. Straight on into the 
unknown we have been plunging ever since leaving San 
Francisco. Only ten or a dozen miles into the west toward 
which we are constantly hastening can we see from the 
steamer's deck; all beyond the horizon is profoundest 
mystery, typical of mysteries no less profound in science 
and faith, which surround us on every hand. In the land of 
which John wrote all problems will be solved, all mysteries 
will be cleared up. " There was no more sea." 

The sea, to the landsman at least, will always mean 
danger. Until he becomes accustomed to their baseless 
terrors the fierce gale, the sudden hurricane, the treacherous 
wave, all seem waiting to engulf him. To the ancients in 
their little shallops these dangers must have been intensified 
and quadrupled. But John in the Revelation saw a 
country where the inhabitants were never afraid — " There 
was no more sea." 

"Lord, bring us, when our voyage of life is ended, to 
that blessed Land of Friendship supernal, of Knowledge un- 
bounded, of Security eternal," is our prayer on this Sabbath 
on the sea. 




CHAPTER II. 

ACROSS THE PACIFIC OCEAN — WELCOME AUSTRALIA. 

The Joys of Terra Firma — The Playground of America — Bewildering 
Vegetation — Brown-skinned Divers — Rum and Missionaries — Ten to 
One — The Future of the Hawaiian — Our Departure — "Fire, Fire" 

— Between the Flames and the Sea — An Exciting Race for Life — 
The Navigators Islands — The First Glimpse — The Samoans as Nature 
Made Them — Stalwart Oarsmen — On Shore Again — Costumes not 
from Paris — Babies in Brown Coats — The Great Event of the Month 

— A Splendid Race — The Sabbath Day Holy in Samoa — A Kingly 
Romance — A Royal Salary — Tappa and Kava — An Appetizing Pro- 
cess — Farewell to the Oasis — An Awful Storm — A Mournful Spectre 

— Our Frolicsome Companions — A Week without a Wednesday — An 
Exaggerated English Channel — New Zealand's Stern and Rugged 
Shores — Goodbye Mariposa. 




HAT the green oases of the des- 
ert with their sweet fountains 
and their sentinel palm trees are 
to the traveler across the sandy 
Sahara, such are two ports at 
which the Oceanic steamers call, 
to the voyager on Pacific waters. 
These two oases are Honolulu in 
the Sandwich Islands, and Apia 
in the Samoan group. 

After only seven days on the wil- 
derness of waves we can truth- 



fully say with Tennyson 



' ' We have had enough of action and of motion ; we 
Rolled to starboard, roll'd to larboard, when the surge was seething free, 
Where the wallowing monster spouted his foam fountains in the sea." 

(50) 



AN OASIS IN THE DESERT OF WATERS. 51 

and now, very early on the seventh morning after the " God 
be with, yon " sounded in our ears from the San Francisco 
pier, we see a faint cloud-like form in the dim horizon. Is it 
a cloud or a mountain % Is it a mist-bank or solid terra 
firma f The strengthening daylight soon and joyously 
resolves our doubts. That blue cloud-like mountain is land ; 
solid, substantial, stable soil ; good gritty ground, which we 
are eager to tread at the first possible moment. 

We do not have long to wait, for soon the Mariposa 
steams majestically into the harbor, dwarfing with her huge 
bulk all the little pigmy boats that come out to meet her, 
and very quickly she is made fast to the Honolulu pier. 

What a new world we are in ! How suddenly our green 
oasis has risen out of the blue desert of the waters ! It can- 
not be that we are only 2,100 miles from San Francisco. 
By all the ordinary analogies of travel w r e have come, at 
least, twenty millions of miles. We could easily imagine 
ourselves on a different planet. 

The vegetation is strange, the people are unique, every 
thing is different from the land we have left. The drive, 
rush, and nervous haste of an American city has given way 
to the languor and luxurious ease of a tropical pleasure 
resort. 

As Switzerland is the summer playground of Europe, the 
Sandwich Islands some day will become the summer and 
winter playground alike of America, for, with its delicious 
air and equable temperature, rarely too warm and never too 
cool, all seasons are its own. 

What magnificent palm trees are these of almost count- 
less varieties ! Cocoanut palms, tall and stately, with the 
yellow nuts hiding far up under the tufted fronds ; date palms 
with their clusters of golden fruit ; royal palms w T ith their 
weeping plumes and tassels ; breadfruit trees, alligator 



52 



DIVING FOR A NICKEL. 



pears, tamarinds, and feathery algeroba trees (on -whose 
" husks " the prodigal of the parable would fain have fed >. 
The variety is bewildering to a traveler from temperate 
climes. 

The people, too, always more interesting than trees or 
vegetables, are as varied as the tree's which wave their 
" fronded palms " above them. The little naked, brown- 
skinned divers on the wharf attract our attention first. 




YOUNG SWIMMERS OF HONOLULU. 



They are all ready, like little lads of fairer skins, to pick up 
an honest penny wherever they can find it. So we toss a 
nickel into the water and over they leap. A dozen brown 
heads disappear beneath the waves, two dozen whitey-brown 
soles appear wriggling vigorously where a second before 
the heads appeared, a momentary but unseen struggle for 
the coveted nickel takes place beneath the water, and then 



VICES AND VIRTUES OF CIVILIZATION. 53 

the little brown heads bob up serenely, and the brown hand 
of the victorious urchin appears above the brine, holding up 
the piece of money to show that he is the winner, before he 
deposits it in that ever ready bank — his mouth. Then, 
with his companions, he is ready for another dive and 
another struggle for the coveted piece of silver. 

But we must not linger on the steamer or on the wharf, 
for there are equally novel sights on shore. There is China- 
town with its swarming Celestials, Portuguese settlements 
with their swarthy, gaily bedecked inhabitants, beautiful 
American and English homes embowered in palms and trop- 
ical plants of all kinds, and the quarters of dusky natives in 
scanty clothing and with gay wreaths around their hats, 
happy, improvident, good-natured, and lazy. 

The lover of the picturesque in human nature, as well as 
in nature physical and geographical, can find enough to 
interest him for many a day in Honolulu. 

Are the natives destined to extinction? Ah, that is a 
question that only time will solve. But, if they are, it must 
be remembered that it will be due to civilization's vices and 
not to civilization's virtues or Christ's religion. 

When it is borne in mind that even before Capt. Cook's 
advent, the islands and the islanders had passed the climax of 
their glory as a race ; that they were engaged in destructive 
wars with each other which were sometimes wars of extermi- 
nation ; when we remember that probably ten ship loads of 
rum have been sent out from Christian England and America 
for every missionary they have dispatched ; that it has taken 
the Latin races eighteen centuries, and the Saxon races 
nearly as long, to reach their present unstable Christian 
equilibrium, and their still imperfect civilization; we are 
surprised, not that the islanders are so imperfect and so 
prone to fetishism and idolatry, but that in a few years 



54 FROM HONOLULU TO APIA. 

they have acquired so much of the Spirit of Him who was 
pure and harmless and undefiled, and who went about doing 
good. The missionary influence is still strong in this beauti- 
ful land, and it shows no signs of waning. 

Many of the most beautiful residences are owned by 
missionaries' sons, who are loyal to the faith of their fathers, 
and much of the business of the islands is in the hands of 
these Christian men. They are influential in the halls of 
legislation and shape the affairs of government. So long as 
such men are to the fore there is confident hope for this 
lovely oasis of the Pacific Desert, 

But the Mariposa's warning whistle sounds; Ave must 
hasten to the wharf. As we stepped aboard, our friends, 
according to the beautiful Hawaiian custom, covered us with 
garlands of jasmine and sweet-scented leaves, and loaded us 
with fruits and beautiful flowers. The royal Hawaiian band 
of forty pieces played "God Save the Queen" and "The 
Star Spangled Banner," and we were off once more across 
the watery waste, bound for another paradise of the Pacific 
— Samoa, 

At about equal distances are these two oases situated 
between San Francisco and Sydney, — Honolulu twenty-one 
hundred miles from America, Apia twenty-one hundred 
miles, or seven days, further. But, though we are sailing 
over summer seas and there is little to disturb the dreamy 
monotony of this particular journey, let not the reader think 
that the voyages are always uneventful. 

Such was not the case on that voyage of the Marvposa^ 
when very early in the morning, so early in fact that only 
the sailors of the morning watch heard it, the dreadful cry 
of "Fire — fire" resounded throughout the ship, and, on 
opening the hatchway, a dense volume of black smoke 
poured up, stifling all Avho came too near. The hose was 



AN AWFUL SECRET. 55 

turned on, but the huge stream of water had no effect on 
the burning flax which composed the cargo. Then the 
hatches were battened down, a small hole bored through 
the partition, and a steam pipe turned in upon the fire, but 
that was equally useless. Several men who went below to 
hoist up the burning bales of flax were asphyxiated, and 
with much exertion were brought back to life again. At 
length the captain, seeing that nothing could prevail, 
stopped up every possible crevice leading to the cargo, 
turned his vessel about, and steamed for Auckland, the 
nearest port, more than three hundred miles distant. 

What can be more awful than a ship on fire in mid- 
ocean? Between the two devouring elements, who can hope 
to escape ? The unpitying fire within, the remorseless sea 
without! For those who knew it, what an awful secret 
must the knowledge of that smouldering cargo have been? 
But few comparatively knew of the disaster. "With rare 
presence of mind Capt. Hayward and his officers kept the 
matter to themselves. The good ship fairly seemed to leap 
through the water. Never did she do better credit to her 
builders. She seemed to realize that she was racing for life. 
The passengers — most of them — did not notice that she 
had turned about and was headed west instead of east. 
The captain suggested a concert in the evening to divert 
attention, and it was carried out in the highest style of 
nautical art. The awful secret was blazing in the hold, 
and the tell-tale smoke sometimes escaped and wreathed 
itself above the deck. And still the Mariposa plowed on 
and on and on, until at last the welcome headlands of 
Auckland harbor loomed up and the wharf was safely 
reached : the treacherous cargo was discharged, and two 
hundred lives that hung on a thread so slender were 
saved. 



56 PALMS AND CORAL REEFS. 

It was soon after noon on a gray and squally day that 
we first caught sight of the hills that rise behind the town 
of Apia, and, after that, with the eagerness of landsmen 
long at sea, we could not keep our eyes off the enchanting 
spectacle. Little by little, the encircling bay of Apia with its 
fringe of majestic palms, its outer coral reef on which the 
surf was dashing high, and its row of native huts interspersed 
with a few European cottages, came into view, and we feasted 
our eyes to our hearts' content on this lovely shore. Imme- 
diately behind the village rises a conical hill, some six 
or eight hundred feet high, and in front the shore is lapped 
by the bright azure-tinted water, whose depths sparkle with 
coral and sea anemones and bright-colored fish. 

But we are still more interested in the Samoans than in 
Samoa ; in men and women and boys and girls, than in hills 
and palm trees and coral reefs and fishes. And here they 
come : Samoans of both sexes and of all ages, for the arrival 
of the monthly mail steamer is a great event in Apia. Some 
of them are in neatly painted white rowboats, but most of 
them put off to meet us in their native dug-outs, long, shal- 
low, and exceedingly narrow boats that would tip over in a 
twinkling, even though the oarsman's hair might be parted 
in the middle, were it not for the inevitable outrider with 
which they are all rigged. This outrider consists of a long 
piece of light cork-like wood, nearly the length of the canoe, 
attached to it with braces at each end. In these light, frail 
canoes the natives ride in the greatest security and go 
through the heaviest surf. "What a picturesque sight it is ! 
There is a young girl with a bright shawl about her waist 
sitting as composedly and as self-poised as a queen in her 
little canoe, while around her feet is a wealth of cocoanuts, 
mangoes, pineapples, and bananas, which she offers for sale 
in a dignified way ; a whole bunch of the latter " for two 



SAMOAN SURF BOATS AND BOATMEN. 57 

bits " (twenty-five cents). There is another large boat ap- 
proaching bearing some official from the island, and rowed 
by half a dozen stalwart, bronze-colored natives, whose bare 
skins, rubbed down with abundant cocoanut oil, glisten in 
the sunlight. Their muscles stand out like whipcord as 
they row in perfect time and splendid form, the despair of 
any Yale or Harvard crew that might witness the sight. 
There is another native boat loaded with fresh fish, neatly 
bundled up in huge green leaves, while sparkling shells and 
coral branches make up the rest of her little cargo. And here 
is a native who somehow has scrambled aboard the Mariposa 
in spite of the efforts of the crew to keep him off, and he 
jabbers and gesticulates at us in true hackman style. "We 
could not understand a word he said, but the unspoken 
language of a cabman is the same the world over, so we 
accepted his offer, which we understood was to take us 
ashore for "two bits," the universal standard of value in 
these regions. We crawled down the ship's side by the 
rope ladder, aided by two strong pair of arms, and were 
soon landed at the little pier. 

There a strange and novel sight, indeed, greeted our 
eyes. The wharf and the streets were swarming with 
natives, young and old, in all kinds of costumes and in no 
costumes at all, who had come down to the water's edge to 
see the great event of the month, the arrival of the mail 
steamer from America. If ever there was a picturesque 
throng of people this was one. The Mother Hubbard dress 
seemed to be the most popular for the women, and for some 
of the men, too, for that matter, but as few could indulge in 
such vanities as an everyday affair there were all kinds of 
variations from the standard mode. 

One man strutted proudly by with as much dignity as a 
Beau Brummel or a Lord Chesterfield could assume, with a 



58 STALWART AND GENTLE CHRISTIAN PEOPLE. 

piece of the native tappa thrown negligently across his 
shoulders ; another stalked past with a bright red tablecloth 
about his loins ; a group of young girls evidently just out 
from the mission school, went tripping past arrayed in a 
piece of white cloth, with a beautiful garland of flowers 
across their shoulders, while babies were invariably arrayed 
solely in the beautiful brown coat which nature first gave 
them. 

The Samoans are a splendid race, physically considered ; 
the most stalwart, as well as the most gentle of all the 
South Sea Islanders. I did not see a single ugly or ma- 
lignant face during my stay at Apia. Homely features 
there are as in every crowd, but few malevolent, vicious, 
sinister faces; smiling looks, unsuspicious manners, intelli- 
gent and even courtly politeness I saw everywhere. 

After seeing these men and women I could easily believe 
what had been told me — that all the natives were Chris- 
tians. About five thousand of them are Catholic, five 
thousand more are "VVesleyans, and the rest of the forty 
thousand inhabitants are under the care of the London Mis- 
sionary Society, which, through its excellent missionaries, 
most admirably looks after their spiritual interests. k ' Oh, 
but they are onty nominal Christians," I can hear my skep- 
tical reader exclaim. Well, dear reader, if we may judge 
them by their fruits their Christianity is not so " nominal " 
as that of most of the people who live in New York and 
Boston, Chicago and San Francisco. If our steamer had en- 
tered the harbor of Apia on a Sunday not a single canoe or 
gaily decked native would have come out to welcome us. 
Not a cocoanut or a bunch of bananas would have been 
offered for sale. All the canoes would have been hauled up 
on the beach, high and dry, and at church time every man, 
woman, and child in the place, barring the sick, would have 



A COMPARISON IN FAVOR OF THE SAMOANS. 59 

been seen wending their way to church. Not such a nom- 
inal religion is that which thus remembers the Sabbath day 
to keep it holy. 

If we should enter any one of these native huts at break- 
fast time we should see all the heads reverently bowed 
while the Divine Blessing was asked, and afterwards all the 
family would come together for morning prayers. If we 
should live among them we should find them honest, gentle, 
peaceable, kind-hearted, affectionate neighbors. Not merely 
nominal Christian graces are these. 

To be sure they have their faults. They are lazy and 
improvident. The family tie is not observed as it should be, 
and doubtless they have minor blemishes. But tell me, dear 
Mrs. Beacon Street or Mr. Fifth Avenue, are fon ready to 
cast the first stone ? The white light of Christianity has 
been beating upon your head and the heads of your ances- 
tors for eighteen hundred years. It is but little more than 
sixty years since the Sun of Righteousness arose upon 
Samoa. You, all your lives, have been inhaling the air of 
Christlike devotion, which once made the martyrs strong to 
do and dare for God. These people, until within sixty 
years, have lived in the fetid atmosphere of heathenism. 
For many generations your forefathers have been growing- 
strong while feeding on the Bread of Life. Only one gener- 
ation has passed away since the symbolic bread was broken 
and the emblematic wine was first poured in Samoa. Who 
will doubt the power of Christianity, or deride the value of 
missionary labor after studying the history of Samoa ? And 
yet there are self-sufficient, purblind people who, with an air 
of knowing all about it, will tell you that the missionaries 
have done more harm than good, that they are responsible 
for the gradual extinction of the natives, and that when 
converted, the natives are not worth the labor expended. 



GO ROYAL VICISSITUDES. 

One finds many men and women who talk in this way 
on the very steamers which visit these islands, and among 
those who actually see these transforming wonders of Chris- 
tianity. I have always noticed, however, that the men who 
talk thus spend most of their time in the smoking-room 
playing poker or betting on the ship's run, while the women 
who express such opinions seem to have no souls above the 
fancy work or the pack of cards they hold in their hands. 
I, for one, should be perfectly willing to set off Samoan 
morality against theirs. 

The Mariposa onl} r remained in Apia long enough to 
exchange mails and discharge a little freight, so we had but 
one or two brief, delightful hours on shore. But these were 
enough to fill us with a longing to spend as many weeks. 
However, we had time to see the long straggling street ; the 
new native church, a beautiful and commodious stone struct- 
ure; the consulates and land commissioners' offices of 
the three powers, America, England, and Germany, that 
really govern Samoa ; the beautiful grounds and pleasant 
buildings of the London Missionary Society, and the royal 
hut of King Malietoa surrounded by palm trees and luxuri- 
ant tropical plants of all kinds. This good King, like some 
sovereigns of more extensive domains, has had his ups and 
downs. Nearly twenty years ago he was elected King, and 
for about ten years he reigned in tranquillity, protected by 
treaties with Germany, England, and the United States. 
Then, however, owing to the interference of the Germans, 
who had cast a covetous e^ye on Samoa, which Uncle Sam 
was none too quick to see and to resent, feuds arose, a rival 
claimant tried to seize the sceptre, and King Malietoa was 
sent as an exile to a distant island in the western Pacific. 
But Germany's avaricious plans were frustrated, the spuri- 
ous claimant whom she had supported was defeated, and 



CLOTH FROM MULBERRY BARK. Gl 

Malietoa was brought back and re-estabKshed on his throne, 
which was then protected by the presence of a man-of-war 
from the United States Navy. He is a good and thoughtful 
Christian man, who sets a kingly example to all his people. 
I am glad to hear that his salary has just been raised and 
that he now receives the royal sum of one hundred dollars a 
month. 

While we were on shore a slight shower arose — a very 
common occurrence in Apia — and as we were without 
umbrellas or mackintoshes we sought shelter in a friendly 
native hut, which consists simply of a thatched roof open on 
every side to the winds of heaven. We were received with 
the utmost politeness, and though there were no chairs or 
lounges, and we were obliged either to stand or to sit on the 
floor, we felt none the less welcome. While thus taking 
shelter we bought from one of the natives a large square of 
tappa, the native cloth, which is ingeniously made of the 
inner bark of a mulberry tree. This bark is first laid in the 
bed of a running stream to soak. After a sufficient time the 
pieces of bark are laid, layer by layer, upon a log, and 
then beaten out to the width required by heavy wooden 
mallets. When the strips have been beaten for some time 
they become blended into one mass, which, by the addition 
of fresh bark, can be increased in length and width as 
required. 

In the beautiful museum at Honolulu the Curator has 
arranged squares of this tappa, which are dyed in all imagin- 
able beautiful colors, in a window through which the 
western light shines. At a little distance one can hardly 
believe that it is not delicate stained glass. 

Another peculiar product of Samoa is kava, the South 
Pacific native drink. Miss Emma A. Adams in her pleasant 
little book about Fiji and Samoa tells how it is made: — 



62 



WEAK TEA AND MEDICATED SOAPSUDS. 



" Kava is prepared from the root of a species of pepper 
tree, found on most of these groups. The shrub attains a 
height of five or six feet, and has a pretty green foliage, 
tinged with purple. The root, having been thoroughly 
washed, is cut in small slices, which are distributed to young 
persons with perfect teeth to be masticated, by which pro- 
cess they are reduced to a complete pulp. Mouthful after 



:iitiii^^ 







■7 ~'-T'^W4?'%A$ 



SAMOAK GIRLS MAKING KAVA. 



mouthful of these little pulpy masses is thrown into a large 
bowl, ceremoniously placed in front of the one who is to 
serve the beverage, and water is then poured upon them. 
The mass is now worked with the hand until all the strength 
and virtue of the fibre is expressed, when it is deftly strained 
away with a bunch of long fibre from the inner bark of the 
hibiscus, and the liquid is now ready for drinking. Its 
appearance is like that of weak tea, its taste like that of 
medicated soapsuds." Will you have a cup, my reader I 



THE FURY OF A TROPICAL STORM. 



63 



But our brief respite from the desert of the sea is nearly 
over. Our hour in the Oasis is spent and the deep-toned 
whistle of the Mariposa calls us on board again. 

Reluctantly we tear ourselves away from our brief 
glimpse of paradise, but go we must. On the wa} T back to 
the steamer we pass the gaunt and mournful spectre of the 
Adler, one of the unfortunate German men-of-war, which, in 
the awful gale of March 15, 1889, was lifted bodily from the 
water and with great fury cast upon the top of the reef and 




ALL THAT REMAINS OF THE "ADLER." 

turned over on her side. There she still lies, her poor ribs 
exposed and bare, with the daylight shining through them 
everywhere, an awful spectacle of the fury of a tropical 
storm in this quiet bay. Near by, but under the waves, lies 
her companion gunboat, the Eher, and the two United States 
steamers, Vandalia and Trenton, which were wrecked and 
utterly destroyed in the same fearful gale in which there 
perished four American officers and forty-seven men, and 
nine German officers and eighty-seven men. Nine hundred 
men were saved from the wrecked shipping in the harbor, 
who were provided for with the utmost generosity and 



G4 BOUNDLESS SKIES AND ENDLESS SEAS. 

humanity by the native Samoans and the foreign residents. 
As the Mariposa steams out of the quiet coral reef with the 
frail native boats dancing all about her, it is hard to realize 
that this peaceful bay was ever the scene of such devastating 
fury. 

Now we may congratulate ourselves that we are more 
than half way to Sydney, more than five thousand miles 
behind us, less than three thousand miles before us. Bound- 
less skies above us, endless seas around us ; that is the 
history of the next six days. Boundless skies flecked by 
many a cloud and sometimes gray and angry with the Storm 
King's wrath ; endless seas flecked by never a sail and dark- 
ened by no trailing steamers' smoke, for, saving the Arctic 
and Antarctic seas, we are on the loneliest ocean of all. 

Only an occasional school of gamboling dolphins, " skip 
jacks " the sailors appropriately call them, enliven the scene. 
In the perfect abandon of good spirits they chase each other 
through the water, tumble over each other, dive under each 
other, and sometimes bear doAvn upon the ship, leaping high 
in the air and turning their yellow bellies to the sun for the 
mere fun of the thing, as boys dive off a log one after the 
other to work off their animal spirits. Then after chasing 
the ship for a dozen miles or more they disappear as 
suddenly as they came and leave us to the sole companion- 
ship of the mild-eyed, curious albatross, which circles 
around and around and around and sometimes falls behind 
but never allows the steamer to get out of sight. The last 
thing at night our albatrosses are there, sometimes follow- 
ing in our wake, sometimes circling over our very heads. 
The first thing in the morning, however early we rise, there 
they are again, the most graceful birds that fly, just lifting 
their wings and steering their course and allowing the wind, 
apparently, to do all the work of flying for them. 



SIX DAYS MAKE ONE WEEK. 



G5 



Thus convoyed we sailed on over the watery waste. 
The necessities of longitudinal reckoning gave us one week 
without a Wednesday. "We went to bed one Tuesday night 
and waked up on Thursday morning and yet we had only 
slept our regulation eight hours. My readers, who will 
remember that we pass the 180° meridian of longitude 
between Samoa and Auckland, will understand the reason 







A MAORI HOUSE. 



for this week with only six days in it. But this week was 
quite long enough. We are very ready to spare one day out 
of it, and very willing to welcome the bluff and rugged 
shores of New Zealand on the sixth day out from Samoa. 

This wonderful island, whose shores look not unlike the 
rockbound coast of our own New England, deserves to have 
a whole book devoted to it. Its wonderful natural re- 
sources, its curious vegetable and animal products, its war- 
like race of natives, the fierce Maoris, and its intrepid and 
enterprising colonists, who have already made New Zealand 



CG 



IN THE STREETS OF AUCKLAND. 



one of the brightest jeAvels in Her Majesty's crown, tempt 
the chronicler's pen to linger long. But Ave only had time 
to see the fine, solidly built streets of Auckland, with its fine 
business blocks, its handsome government buildings, and its 
great tabernacle erected by Eev. Thomas Spurgeon, a son of 




MAORI IDOLS. 

the famous preacher; to receive a most hearty welcome 
from Auckland's ministers, and lay Christian workers, to 
attend a thoroughly enthusiastic Christian Endeavor meet- 
ing in the Ponsonby Baptist Church, and then we were off 
again ; always off, for the restless Mariposa will never 
be satisfied until she reaches her dock at Sydney. 

Then came five days more of ocean traveling across the 



SAFE WITHIN THE HARBOR OF SYDNEY. 



67 



wide and turbulent channel that stretches between New 
Zealand and Australia. This particular strip of water has 
a very bad reputation. It is considered a kind of exagger- 
ated English Channel, and my readers who have experienced 
the bitterness of that piece of salt water between Newhaven 
and Dieppe, or Dover and Calais, will understand all the 
miseries which such a voyage implies. Think of spending 
five days tossing about like an intoxicated cork on the 
English Channel, and you will know something of what the 
voyage between Auckland and Sydney often is. But, fortu- 
nately, on this voyage Neptune did not seriously test our 
courage or our seamanship. We had bright skies and com- 
paratively smooth seas, and on the morning of the fifth day 
from Auckland and the twenty-fifth from San Francisco, 
"land ahead" was the welcome cry ; Sydney Heads loomed 
up in the distance ; we found our way through the narrow 
channel which Capt. Cook so narrowly missed a hundred 
years ago, and, after three and one-half weeks of rolling and 
tossing and pitching and heaving on the vast Pacific, found 
ourselves safe within the splendid land-locked harbor of 
Sydney, to which our good pilot had steered over 7,000 miles 
of trackless lonely waves. 

Goodbye, Mariposa. Welcome, Australia. 




CHAPTER III. 

A NEW CONTINENT-^ FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF AUSTRALIA. 

A New Continent — A Magnificent Harbor — Torres' Mistake — The 
Flight of the Dove — "The Endeavor" — An Important Astronomi- 
cal Discovery — A Vast Noah's Ark — Great Grandfather Animals — 
The Bushman and His Fate — What the Savage could not do — Un- 
certain Rain and Certain Drought — Australian Oddities — Confused 
Trees — Topsy-Turvyness — Preconceived Notions — The Englishman 
the World Over — The Evolution of the Yankee Drawl — Colonial 
Days — " The Great American Desert " — Mother and Daughter — How 
the Old Lady Treats Her Child — English or American — Architectural 
Differences — Big Names — " Elevator " or " Lift " — "Barber's Shop " 
" Tonsorial Palace" — American Inventions in Australia — The Home 
of Anarchy and Unrest — Country Life versus City Life — The " Bluey" 
and the ' ' Billy " — The ' ' Larrikin " — A " New Chum " — Modesty Be- 
coming a Literary New Chum. 




TRAVELER'S first impressions 
of a new land, while not always 
the most accurate, are usually 
the most vivid and interesting. 
How many pulses have thrilled 
with curiosity and pleasure as 
they have seen the rough coast 
of old Ireland for the first time 
when approaching the Old World 
from the New, for there in the 
shadowy distance, somewhere be- 
hind the frowning cliffs of Erin, 
lies all the mystery of antiquity, all the historic associations 
of 2,000 } r ears. In fact, the accumulation of 6,000 years of 
history and civilization are represented by that little stormy 

( 68 ) 



SYDNEY HEADLANDS AND HARBOR. 69 

strip of Irish coast to the voyager from the land which has 
few monuments and no ruins, and only a brief history. 

With every new land one approaches, these first impres- 
sions are renewed, and so when the bluff lines of Sydney 
Heads rear themselves on the horizon we eagerly crane our 
necks and strain our eyes for a glimpse of the new Australian 
continent which is about to open before us. We do not have 
to wait long for a fuller revelation of the fair vision, for 
very soon after the headlands are sighted we steam in be- 
tween the two sentinels that guard the magnificent land- 
locked harbor of Sydney. 

No wonder that the New South Welchmen are proud of 
their harbor, " as proud as though they had scooped it out 
themselves," as some one has ill-naturedly remarked. It is 
one of the harbors that cannot be overpraised. A small dic- 
tionary of adjectives might be emptied upon the description 
and it would scarcely be overdone. 

It has hundreds of miles of coast line, and on the map 
looks like a great octopus which has been flattened out by 
some tremendous kind of hydraulic pressure, whose arms 
and tentacles run far* up into the country, affording number- 
less beautiful bays and lovely retreats, which, in many 
places, are as wild and rugged as when Capt. Cook first 
sailed by the narrow entrance ; for it is a singular fact that 
this bold navigator, though he discovered Botany Bay only 
a few miles distant, entirely passed by this most wonderful 
harbor, so straight and narrow is the way that leads to it 
from the open sea. 

In fact, the early navigators all seem to have had diffi- 
culty in finding this great continent. One would think that 
a magnificent stretch of land which occupies so large a por- 
tion of the earth's surface could have been easily discovered, 
especially by those who are searching for it, but .in those 



SKILLFUL PILOTING OF TO-DAY. 

days in the little shallops that were at the command of the 
explorers, it was no easy thing to discover even such a vast 
island as Australia. 

To-day the navigator sets sail from San Francisco, 7,000 
miles away, and, precisely on schedule time, to a single hour 
probably, with trusty compass and skillful pilot, he will steer 
.straight through the middle of the narrow passage that 
leads to the city of Sydney. But 300 years ago, without 
■chart or pilot, it was a different thing to feel one's way 
across these misty, unknown seas at the mercy of the uncer- 
tain sails and the certain gales of the Southern Pacific. 
Although it seems that he could not have missed the island 
continent he was searching for, yet it is said that Torres, the 
bold navigator, sailed directly through the narrow strait 
which now bears his name, and which separates Australia 
from New Guinea, without knowing that there was land on 
either side ; certainly without knowing that he was almost 
within sight of one of the mightiest divisions of the earth's 
surface. lie missed the glory by a hair's breadth, as it were, 
of adding to his laurels and perhaps giving his name to a 
continent. 

Other early navigators had the same difficulty in finding 
this elusive land. The Dutch in the Drey/hen, or Dove, a 
little vessel which stretched its wings and flew away from 
Holland in the year 1606, first saw the main land of Aus- 
tralia, but the Dutch had no use for it, and did not think it 
worth while to claim possession. 

Perhaps from their standpoint of a home-land half sub- 
merged with water, they did not appreciate such a high and 
dry continent as Australia proved to be. At any rate they 
made no attempt to explore or colonize the land, and it was 
left to Captain Cook, more than 150 years later, to make the 
first discovery which was really of value to the European 



THE NOAH'S ARK OF THE NATURALIST. 71 

world. He set sail in the little ship Endeavor • suggestive 
name that, considering the purpose which has taken the 
writer of this chronicle to Australia. His principal purpose 
was to make observations in regard to the transit of Venus 
which was not visible in the Western Hemisphere, but he 
combined discovery with astronomy, and not only proved 
from the transit of Venus that the sun was something more 
than ninety millions of miles away from the earth, a dis- 
tance which, up to that time, had not been accurately meas- 
ured, but also proved that there was a vast unknown land in 
in these southern seas waiting for the first occupant who 
might raise the national flag and take possession in the 
name of modern civilization and Christianity. 

Geologically, Australia is said to be one of the oldest 
portions of the earth's surface, and in its physical aspects 
and natural products it is extremely interesting to the nat- 
uralist. In fact, it is a kind of Noah's Ark in which has 
been preserved the animals and the plants which long ago 
died out of Europe and America, The animals which in 
the older world flourished in the secondary and tertiary 
period, but which are now as extinct as the Dodo himself, 
are still found in large numbers in this land. The kangaroo 
and the wallaby and all the allied races of marsupials which 
once were common in Europe and America, are distinctive 
and characteristic animals of Australia. 

The reason, says the naturalist, for this strange survival 
of these great-grandfather animals which long ago gave up 
the ghost in Europe, is, that Australia has not been sub- 
jected to such fearful convulsions of nature as the rest of the 
world. She has not been drowned out by the flood or 
ground down by the glacier, or had all her animal and vege- 
table life frozen up in a great ice age ; so these interesting 
animals of a pre-historic period still live and flourish on her 



NATURE HOSTILE TO THE SAVAGE. 



vast inland plains. Australia, however, could never become 
a great and important factor in the world's progress without 
the aid of civilized men. Her natural resources, though 
great, required to be developed. The rainy seasons are 
uncertain over a large portion of the continent, and the 
droughts alone can be relied upon. They come with pro- 
voking regularity. 




MALE ABORIGINAL AUSTRALIAN. 

The savage could not tickle this ground with a hoe and 
expect it to smile with a harvest. He could not plant a 
cocoanut tree and live under its shade and on its nuts all the 
rest of his days. The arid soil, the intense heat, and the 
lack of moisture were against him, and as he could not cope 
with these natural disadvantages without the appliances of 
civilization, the poor fellow became a very abject and 
wretched specimen of a human being ; not fierce and strong 
like the North American Indian, not vigorous and warlike 



THE WHITE MAN'S PLOW AND SPADE. 



73 



like the Zulu, not gay and careless in the abundance of trop- 
ical bounty like the South Sea Islander; he degenerated 
into a poor, miserable, abject bushman, who has already 
been, for the most part, " civilized " off the face of the earth. 
But poor as was the country for the untutored savage 
when the white man came with his plow and his spade, 
his steam drill and his locomotive, this neglected continent 




FEMALE ABORIGINAL AUSTRALIAN. 



became a new land and has yet a great place to fill among 
the nations of the earth. Civilized man with the history of 
the ages behind him, was able to make the desert blossom as 
the rose ; to store the water of the wet season for the exi- 
gencies of the dry ; to find in the nutritious buffalo grass the 
best fodder in all the world for his sheep, and to discover in 
the bowels of the earth the richest stores of gold that have 
ever been unearthed since the days of King Solomon. 



H 



PERPLEXING TO STRANGERS. 




Where savages could not live the Englishman has built some 
of the most magnificent cities on the surface of the globe ; 
where the poor bushmen grew thin and emaciated, with 
scarcely strength or spirit left to spear a kangaroo, the Eng- 
lishman has grown stout and healthy, hearty and happy, 
and is founding a new nation which will surely be in the 
future ages the greater Britain. 

When one first comes to Australia many things strike 
him as being strange and out of place, but he soon begins to 

ask whether possibly his notions 
and ideas are not at fault, and 
not the country, and whether he 
is not carrying his traditional pre- 
judices around with him. Why, 
for instance, should not the trees 
put forth their buds and leaves 
in September instead of in April ? 
It looks odd enough at first 
when the traveler reaches Australian shores after the scorch- 
ing days of midsummer and the early breezes of fall have 
begun to blow, to find that summer is not behind him but 
before him, that it is not autumn, but spring ; that the trees, 
instead of doffing their fall livery, are donning their spring 
dresses, and that all nature is waiving up for a new year of 
growth and activity. 

It is said that the trees that are transplanted from 
Europe or North America, are themselves very much con- 
fused by this change in their surroundings ; that at first 
they make a few feeble attempts to bud forth in May and 
drop their leaves in October, but they soon accept the Aus- 
tralian seasons as they are made for them. 

A most excellent thing it is for a man of unreasonable 
prejudices and provincial proclivities, to take such a journey 



ABORIGINAL METHOD OF 
PRODUCING FIRE. 



AN OVERTURNING OF PRECONCEIVED IDEAS. 75 

as this. All his preconceived notions are knocked on the 
head, so to speak. His ideas of what is fit and proper for 
Nature to do are completely upset, and if he is a wise man 
he will begin to say, perhaps, after all, wisdom will not die 
with me, possibly my ancestors did not know everything 
there was to be known, and there may be new ways and 
methods which are not to be despised simply because I was 
not educated in them. I know of more than one good man 
whose eminently respectable ideas I would like to have 
turned topsy-turvy by some such transition from a northern 
to a southern hemisphere of thought. 

But it must be confessed that in other ways besides turn- 
ing the seasons end to end, Australia works havoc with our 
preconceived notions of things. The cherries, for instance, 
instead of covering up their stones with a good layer of flesh, 
wear their hearts upon their sleeves, so to speak, or at least, 
bear their pits upon the outside, instead of beneath the skin, 
as all well-regulated cherries are supposed to do. The 
Eucalyptus trees, and some other varieties, instead of shed- 
ding their leaves, have a strange fashion of shedding their 
bark, and one sees great forests of them standing bare and 
gaunt, with the bark falling off in shreds and ribbons while 
they stretch their white arms heavenward, but their tops are 
always covered with a dull green leaf which they never part 
with under any circumstances. 

Much of the Australian wood, instead of floating as all 
well-regulated wood should float when thrown into the 
water, sinks to the bottom. Many of the flowers cover the 
outside of their petals with bright colors instead of the in- 
side, as modest English flowers almost always do, and there 
are various anomalies of this sort, which, however, are only 
anomalies, I suppose, because of our imperfect and narrow 
vision. I did not hear that water ran up hill in Australia, or 



7G THE AGGRESSIVE ANGLO-SAXON. 

that rain was dry and snow hot, hut I should scarcely have 
been surprised to learn of such discrepancies before I went 
away. 

After all, civilized human nature is very much the same, 
however natural products and inanimate nature differs in 
different parts of the world. Love and hate, joy and sor- 
row, fear and hope, I find, are exactly the same at the 
Antipodes as in the countries with which I am familiar. 
Human nature does not differ in its characteristics by being- 
transplanted from one hemisphere to another. The English- 
man is very much the same sort of a creature wherever 
he is found, whether transplanted to America to acquire the 
alleged " Yankee drawl " and the sharp features which I 
must say I think exist largely in the humorist's novel, or 
whether he crosses the southern seas to take up his abode in 
Australasia ; — he is the same sort of a being — resolute, 
aggressive, pushing, fearless ; sometimes hauglnVy and arro- 
gant in his treatment of inferior races, often prejudiced and 
unjust in his judgment of others, but nevertheless a mighty 
and potent factor in the world's civilization. "Without him 
what would be the vast prairies of America, or the mighty 
sea-girt continent of which I am writing I If ever there was 
a providential race raised up of God to do a particular work 
in the world and exert a mighty civilizing agency, that race 
is the Anglo-Saxon. 

I feel that it is necessary to be cautious in recording my 
impressions of the English race in Australia lest I lay myself 
open to the same charges which I am tempted to bring 
oftentimes against other hasty travelers who have skipped 
through America at the rate of a mile a minute and then 
made up their minds that they know all about it. My warm 
American blood sometimes boils with not a little indignation 
;as I hear our institutions slurred and our public men de- 



IN THE VANGUARD OF CIVILIZATION. 77 

famed by those who know nothing about either one or the 
other. So I must be careful not to raise the blood of anyone 
else to the boiling point with unfounded criticisms. Still, as 
everyone must give his impressions, I would say that the 
Colonies, so far as I have seen them and talked with repre- 
sentative Australians, strikes me as being in a period corre- 
sponding to the Colonial days of America before the glorious 
era of 1776 dawned upon us. 

Not that the Australian Colonies are 100 years behind 




IN THE GROUNDS OP GOVERNMENT HOUSE, SYDNEY. 

the times by any means. They are fully abreast of the most 
recent civilization. All the appliances and inventions and 
elegancies of civilized life are found here, and I imagine that 
a new invention of Edison, or a labor-saving contrivance of 
McCormick, would be introduced quite as soon into these 
progressive, go-ahead colonies as they would in any part of 
America, and far more rapidly than they would be likely to 
be introduced into England. The fashions, too, are as recent, 
for aught I know ; the store windows are certainly as ele- 
gant, the streets of such cities as Melbourne are as wide, 
and the public buildings as magnificent as any that can be 



78 VAST DESERTS AND UNWATERED PLAINS. 

found in all the world. Yet I am reminded every day that in 

some respects Australia is very much like North America 

' ' In the good old Colony days 
When we lived under the King." 

The population of these Colonies is very nearly the same as 
of the 13 original States that" made up the Union in 1776, 
something like three or four millions of people forming a 
fringe of settlement along the seashore for thousands of 
miles. The far interior, for the most part, is a terra incog- 
nita, waiting for the hardy pioneer and the adventurous 
settler. 

When I was a boy, and that is not so very many years 
ago after all, the old geographies still had a tract of land 
covering nearly the whole area west of the Mississippi, 
labeled " The Great American Desert." Gradually this 
great American Desert has grown smaller by degrees and 
beautifully less until it is now confined to a comparatively 
narrow strip of outlying plains, which themselves are not be- 
yond hope of ultimate redemption. So I have no doubt the 
vast deserts and unwatered plains of the unexplored interior 
of this mighty land will one of these days yield to the 
prowess of the pioneer and the sturdy toil of the settler until 
all Australia blossoms like the rose. 

In its political features, too, the Australasian Colonies are 
not at all unlike the American Colonies before the Revolu- 
tion. Jealous of their rights, they brook no interference 
from the Mother Country to which they still owe allegiance. 
If she should attempt to impose a tax on tea there would be 
the greatest tea-party in Melbourne Harbor that was ever 
seen. The Boston tea-party would scarcely be a circum- 
stance to this Australian u tea-meeting." If an obstinate 
Kino- George III was on the throne instead of her Gracious 
Majesty ( " her Goodness-Gracious Majesty " some of the 



AN INDULGENT MOTHER. 79 

Australian papers call her) Queen Victoria, it would not 
be long, probably, before these Colonies would set up house- 
keeping for themselves, and cut themselves wholly adrift 
from Mother England, that keeps house at home. But, as it 
is, they feel no pressure of maternal authority. 

The old lady sometimes scolds, to be sure, and is some- 
times considered indifferent to her children's welfare, but 
she never attempts to "boss" them ("boss, 1 ' by the way, 
is as good Australian as it is American), and so the Colo- 
nies give a willing, if not in all cases a very enthusiastic, 
allegiance to the Mother Land. 

In the " good old Colony days," too, of which we sing, if 
I read history aright, our different colonies were very jeal- 
ous of each other — each afraid that the other would gain 
the advantage and obtain some predominant power. 

History is repeating itself again in this Southern world. 
Whether the principle of free trade or protection is the true 
one I have no occasion to say in this chronicle, but it does 
seem very strange that the Colonies should protect them- 
selves so zealously one against another. They are raising 
their tariff duties higher and higher, I understand, not only 
against all the rest of the world, but against their sister 
colonies. The oranges of New South Wales must be taxed 
before they can come into Victoria, and the rugs of New 
Zealand must pay a heavy duty before they can be wrapped 
round Australian knees. It is as though New Hampshire 
should protect herself against the dread incursions of Ver- 
mont maple sugar, and Vermont should set up a barrier 
against the exportation of New Hampshire granite, and 
Florida should object to Maine ice unless it was duly taxed, 
and Maine should retort by putting an impost on Florida 
oranges. However, federation is in the air just as it was in 
the North American air in the latter part of the last cen- 
tury. 



80 A PROPHECY OF FEDERATION. 

There is federation already in sentiment and purpose 
against the aggression of all the rest of the world. There is 
federation of Christian sentiment and religious purpose, and, 
doubtless, before the 19th century comes to a close there will 
be political federation, just as the close of the 18th century 
marks the political federation which has ever since been 
growing stronger and stronger between the states of the 
American Union. 

Another impression which I have received is that Aus- 
tralia is a mixture in about equal proportions of British 
conservatism and American aggressiveness, a splendid mix- 
ture that, since both qualities are needed to make up the 
ideal race, and either alone, though admirable in itself, can 
be carried too far. Sydney is said to be very English, Mel- 
bourne very American, and I think there is some reason for 
this distinction, which the Australians often comment upon 
themselves. Sydney was settled 100 years ago, and its nar- 
row streets and crooked lanes remind me of the picturesque 
city which, like all loyal Bostonians, I regard, of course, as 
the "hub" of the Universe. 

Melbourne, on the other hand, is a modern city built 
within the last 50 years, and its wide- streets and elegant 
boulevards, its magnificent public buildings, and extensive 
stores, would lead one who was set down in it with his eyes 
blindfolded to imagine he was in any one of half a dozen of 
our most wide-awake western cities. To be sure he would 
find it rather cleaner than most of them, and with no dense 
pall of smoke hiding its beauties. He would heave a sigh 
and wish that our streets might be as well paved and kept 
as clean, but, with the exception of a few minor matters of 
this sort, he would be eminently at home in the beautiful 
city of Melbourne. 

In Sydney almost every house has its balcony, and this 



JOHN BULL VerSUS BROTHER JONATHAN. 81 

is also a common method of architecture in Melbourne. 
Houses in Australia are built for hot weather (throughout 
the largest part of the American continent they are built for 
cold weather) hence the slight differences of architecture 
which we notice. 

There are, indeed, very many things that remind me of 
the old country, but these are all balanced by Americanisms 
which appear at every corner. 

For instance, I have more than once seen the sign 
" Mangling done here," which always reminded me of the 
unfortunate Mr. Mantalini. "We should call the establish- 
ment a laundry, I suppose. The druggists are almost all 
"chemists," and they have no extravagant marble fountain 
with forty-two different kinds of American drinks issuing 
therefrom, in the front part of their stores. "Beef and 
ham" shops 1 have often seen, but why a man who sells 
ham should not also sell lamb or other butcher's meat I can- 
not quite determine. 

The street cars are all "trams." The elevators are all 
"lifts," and the railway cars are all "coaches." "Why is it 
that you Americans always give such a big name to every- 
thing," said an Australian gentleman to me the other day. 
" Why do you call a lift an ' elevator,' and why is your 
'classroom' a 'recitation hall,' and why is your barber's 
shop usually a 'tonsorial palace'?" I am still pondering 
these questions, and have not arrived as yet at any satisfac- 
tory answer. 

But, if there is much that is English there is also as 
much that is distinctively American about these colonies. 
Upon a dozen articles of common use I have seen the name 
"Salem, Mass.," or "Springfield, Mass.," or "Pittsburgh, 
Pennsylvania," or "Chicago, Illinois." American books, 
American watches and typewriters, American lamps and 



82 AMERICAN INVENTIONS — "AMERICAN BARS." 

bicycles, American incandescent lights and telephones, and 
alas ! many " American bars " from which, as the signs tell 
us, American drinks are dispensed, are to be seen every- 
where. I am not at all proud of this last Americanism, but 
in many of the Continental cities of Europe the American 
bar is the only American thing that you will see in all the 
city. 

On the railway between Sydney and Melbourne, Pull- 
man cars of the very best construction are used, and on the 
Melbourne streets the swift cable cars which I think must 
have been made in Troy, New York, give one the impression 
that he cannot be far from Kansas City, or Omaha, or San 
Francisco. In one very important way, however, the Aus- 
tralian colonies differ from our early American colonies, and 
that is in the predominance of the city life over the country 
life. I should think that fully 50 per cent, of the people of 
Australia live to-day in the cities, large or small ; nearly 
one-half of the inhabitants of Victoria are gathered together 
along the beautiful streets of Melbourne. So in New South 
Wales, Sydney absorbs a large proportion of the population, 
Avhile in South Australia, Adelaide is not only the capital 
and metropolis, but the one center for a vast territory. 

The rural population of America is in some sections 
sadly on the wane. The great cities are great magnets 
everywhere which draw the people from the country to 
themselves. Until the poles of this magnet can be reversed 
in some way, both in Australia and America, and the people 
find that their happiness is not in the crowded streets of an 
overpopulated city, but amid the peace and plenty of coun- 
try life, a great danger will always menace these two great 
continents. Discontent, anarchy, and revolution, with all 
their hideous evils, are breathed in the great cities ; the fresh 
country winds blow the cobwebs out of the brain, and dis- 



FREE AND HAPPY COUNTRY LIFE. 



83 



content out of the heart. Until both Australia and America 
become filled with small landholders, each cultivating his 
own little piece of God's earth, the problems of their fu- 
ture destiny will not all be solved. 

But, predominant as city life is in Australia, the influ- 




IN THE BUSH. 



ence of the early settler, the squatter, and the bush man is 
still felt. Most of the distinctive Australian slang which I 
have heard can be traced back to these sources — thus the 
" billabong " is the backwater of a river ; the " lagoon," we 
should call it at home. The " bluey " is the blanket of the 
frontiersman in which he wraps himself at night and lies 
down to sleep wherever he may be, under the silent stars. 



84 



AUSTRALIAN SLANG. 



The " billy " is the can in which he cooks first his tea and 
then his meat. We may be sure he relishes them both be- 
cause of the splendid appetite sauce which was always upon 
his table. These terms have now degenerated to denote the 
properties of the tramp, and the bundle which he carries 
upon his back is his " swag." The " larrikin " is the street 
loafer, and a very unpleasant type of street loafer he is, too, 
as developed in these colonies. I, myself, am a " new 
chum," as every new arrival is styled in Australian dialect ; 
and, until I had been here at least five years, I could be 
only a " new chum," corresponding to the " tenderfoot" of 
our mining camps. It is surely becoming that a new chum 
should be careful in his commendations and modest in his 
criticisms. Perhaps it is high time, therefore, that I should 
bring this chapter to an end, before I commit the usual indis- 
cretion of a literary "new chum " in a strange land. 




CHAPTEK IV. 



AUSTRALIA AND AUSTRALIANS — LITTLE MATTERS ABOUT 
A GREAT COUNTRY. 

The Houses the People Live in — Stone Instead of Wood — An English- 
man's Castle — Plenty of Soil — " Strathroy " versus " 1229 E. 341 St." 
— "Bacchus, Cestus, Festus" — How They Travel — The Railways — 
Inside the House — At the Dinner Table — A Pleasant Custom — 
Scarcity of Cold Water — The Newspapers — Sometimes Dull but 
Seldom Sensational — Some Budding Poets — Specimen of Obituary 
Poetry — Outdoor Life — National Games — A Mighty Curse — The 
Turf Adviser — The Totalisator — Church Life — Great Conventions — 
The Singing — Cable Absurdities — A Mexican Invasion — Kissing his 
Wife on the Street — Gum-chewing Girls — Chicago Girls and Boston 
Maidens — Introducing Friends. 

OME of the little things that seem 
to me to be characteristic of 
Australian life may seem hardly 
worth mentioning in serious con- 
verse, and yet it is these little 
matters that differentiate our 
Australian cousins from their 
American relatives. 

In other lands it is easy to 

paint the picture with broad 

touches of the brush, but in a 

country so much like our own, 

and among a people who, so far as all outward characteristics 

go, live across the street, instead of across the Pacific ocean. 

we find peculiarities and differences only in minute things. 

The house in which the Australian lives, for instance, 

6 (85) 




SG COMFORT IN SECLUSION. 

though a most comfortable one, and often an elegant man- 
sion, is different in some slight particulars from that in 
which his American relative would take up his abode. It is 
almost invariably built of stone or brick, even in the coun- 
try, instead of wood ; the reason being, I suppose, that 
timber is scarce and high, comparatively speaking, and the 
native woods do not easily lend themselves to the house- 
builder's art. 

At any rate, one sees very few modern houses of the 
st} r le which make our suburban cities and country villages 
so bright and attractive, with their many colors and their 
varied styles of architecture. 

Many of the houses here, even of the better class, are one- 
story buildings, with bedrooms as well as parlors and din- 
ing-rooms on the ground floor, but they are high and com- 
modious apartments and doubtless have some advantages in 
this hot climate over the many-storied structures with which 
we are acquainted. Moreover, for every Australian his 
house is his castle, and in this matter he shows his English 
breeding and training. He shuts himself in from all the 
world with hio-h hedges and fences. The crusade for the 
abolishment of fences and hedges, with which we are so 
familiar, would meet with no favor in this land. 

So it comes about that the streets of the suburban towns 
liave a more forbidding and unsocial aspect than our streets 
at home. There is none of the park-like effect which is 
given to a beautiful suburban town, by removing all fences 
and obstacles to the view, and allowing the premises of ad- 
joining neighbors to come together with only an imaginary 
line between them. But after all when you once get behind 
an Australian's fence or an Englishman's hedge, there is a joy 
in the sense of seclusion and quiet retirement which one can 
hardly experience in the open thoroughfare of an American 



SPACE ENOUGH AND TO SPARE. 



87 



town. You find, too, that what you took for exclusiveness 
is only a national reserve and that the warmest kind of hos- 
pitality is extended to those who get behind these forbidding 
fences. 

The Australian believes in having plenty of land about 
him, and why shouldn't he ? If there is one thing of which 
there is enough in this great continent, it is Mother Earth. 
Only a little fringe of her soil here as yet has been subdued. 
No wonder that the Australian householder chooses to have 




IN ADELAIDE. 



a good generous quota for his house-lot and garden. The 
result is that these cities spread out enormously, and "Wash- 
ington must yield the palm of being considered " the city of 
magnificent distances" to Melbourne and Sydney and Ad- 
elaide and Ballarat. In Melbourne, for instance, there seems 
to be no residential portion of the city for the better classes 
within less than three or four miles from Collins street, and 
thousands of the business men live half a score of miles or 
more away from their offices. 

When we get to their houses we find that each one has a 
distinctive individuality of its own, which is very pleasing to 
one accustomed to residences known only by an unsympa- 



88 DISTINCTIVE NAMES. 

thetic number. For instance, it is much more pleasing, in 
my estimation, to live at " Strathro} 7 ," or "St. Kilda," or 
" Haroldine," than to have your abode at " 1229 East 31st 
street." How can children ever have an affection for " ISo. 
627"? How can the household gods ever be permanently 
set up on a six-story flat in "429£ A, 79th Avenue"? 

But to have a home of your own with its distinctive 
name which is appropriated by no one else ! Ah ! there is- 
a sensation of homeliness comes over one when we but see 
the name upon the gate post ! 

However, some of these names, I must say, strike me as 
peculiar. In order to get a different home designation from 
any one else, children's names are sometimes used, and I 
have seen " Emma House " and " Alice Terrace " and 
"Maudina" and " Susana." One row of houses which I 
have seen was named "Voltaire," " Rousseau," and " Kenan." 
How any builder could hope to let such houses to a Chris- 
tian, I do not understand. 

Still another terrace of houses I have seen labeled 
" Bacchus," " Cestus, " and " Festus." "With all my love 
for individuality and for distinctive names, I must say I 
think that this is a little overdoing it. I should always feel 
ashamed to live in a house that bore the name of the old 
inebriate " Bacchus " ; and as for dating my letters from 
" Festus," I would pay a largely increased rent rather than 
submit to any such indignity. 

I have found the modes of roadway traveling in Aus- 
tralia much like those to which we are accustomed, with the 
exception that our friends here very much affect a certain 
species of English trap which I have never seen at home, in 
which the driver has the best seat of all, and the people 
Avhom he drives, if there is more than one, get along as best 
they can on a kind of perch with their backs to the horses. 



A WELL MANAGED RAILWAY SYSTEM. 89 

while they are careful to avoid the driver's reins which are 
always in close proximity to their ears. However, this trap 
has the advantage of being* roomy and easy to enter, and for 
father and mother and a small family of children is just the 
thing. 

The railroads seem to me well managed and well 
equipped. The road beds are splendidly ballasted, the sta- 
tions are substantial though not elegant, and everything- 
about the rolling stock is on a par with our first-class Amer- 
ican roads. 

To be sure they cling to the old, exclusive, English com- 
partment system for the most part, but the cars are well 
upholstered, and nearly all who can afford it seem to ride 
first-class, whereas in England it is a common saying that 
only lords, fools, and Americans ever patronize the first-class 
railway carriage. I have seen no third-class cars, and the 
second-class are very comfortable, though far outnumbered 
by the first-class compartments. 

On some of the roads Pullman cars are in constant use. 
On others, Mann boudoir cars are preferred. Grade cross- 
ings are abolished as far as possible, and more care is taken 
of life and limb than on our average railway lines. Here 
one steps immediately from the platform into the car, in- 
stead of going up two or three steps as in our cars, and a 
bell about the size of a dinner bell, vigorously rung, 
announces the hour of departure. 

To show how much custom has to do with our views of 
the fitness of things, I was amused to hear an Australian 
friend, who had been traveling in America, say that it 
seemed strange to her to climb a short flight of stairs before 
getting into our cars, and that it seemed preposterous for 
the engineer to ring a bell as big as a church bell whenever 
the train started. "Well. I had always regarded the three 



90 FOUR MEALS A DAY. 

or four steps as the most natural means of getting into a 
railway car myself, and as for the church-bell to which she 
alluded, I had never regarded it in that preposterous light. 
But I thought I would be careful after hearing her remark 
about saying anything about the Australian railway dinner 
bell, or any other little peculiarities which struck me as 
oddities. 

We have found now our Australian home and the means 
of locomotion by which we reach it. As Ave enter the aver- 
age home of the well-to-do, we find a large and commodious 
parlor, a well-stocked library, a dining-room and a breakfast 
room, which in the season (and almost every season in Aus- 
tralia is the season of flowers) are gay with blossoms from 
the abundant garden. 

The dining-room always interests the hungry traveler, so 
we will enter it. A beautiful fashion, which I have never 
seen practiced to the same extent elsewhere, is that of deco- 
rating the table, for it is typical of the Australian as of the 
Englishman that he makes a good deal more of the dining 
table than is usually done by the average American family. 

He indulges in four meals instead of three, though the 
late supper at night is often a very informal affair, and .he 
frequently finds room for a cup of tea between meals. As 
for getting along on two meals a day, as some of our more 
assthetic New Englanders are accustomed to do, he would 
spurn the idea. The center of the table is beautifully deco- 
rated with bright velvet or brilliant cloths of other kinds,, 
and is gay with flowers, and often in the evening with fairy 
lamps, which add to the brilliant effect. The average Aus- 
tralian does not indulge in so many hot biscuits, porterhouse 
steaks, buckwheat cakes, etc., as his friends across the sea, 
but his table is always abundantly and often lavishly spread 
with cold meats, bread of different kinds, pastries and pud^ 



GINGER ALE OR ICE WATER. 91 

dings, and " sweets " under which generic term are grouped 
marmalade and jam, jellies and syrups of various kinds. 

Of course the teapot is there, occasionally the coffeepot,, 
very often the syphon of seltzer water and ginger ale, and., 
most rarely of all, the water pitcher. In fact, I think that 
some of my Australian friends scarcely know the taste of 
unadulterated water, and, as for ice water, I imagine they: 
would abominate it as an invention of the arch enemy of 
mankind. I have seen hands held up almost in horror at the 
thought of the dreadful American practice of drinking ice 
water on all possible occasions, and under all circumstances,, 
and it seems to be a standing wonder with many, how any 
of us manage to survive the period of infancy with all the 
various iced drinks and the vast amount of plain water that 
we make way with. 

After breakfast we, of course, take up our morning- paper T 
and here it is, damp from the press. I must say, that to my 
somewhat vitiated taste, perhaps, some of these daily papers- 
seem extremely dull, but I am inclined to charge this im- 
pression to two facts. In the first place, they contain almost 
no American news, unless, possibly, John L. Sullivan, or 
some such slugger, happens to have received an unmerciful 
pounding (in which result we all devoutly rejoice). In the 
second place, a stranger never knows where to look for what 
he wants in an unaccustomed newspaper, so, though it may 
contain many morsels which he would be glad to read, he is: 
apt to throw it aside impatiently with the reflection that it 
is dull and stupid. 

But if this charge can be preferred with some force,, 
there is something far worse than dullness, and that is the 
outrageous sensationalism which disgraces many of our own 
papers. These papers are at least dignified, and, for the 
most part, high in their moral tone. Some of the afternoon 



92 DULL BUT DIGNIFIED. 

journals, to be sure, are imitating a bad American example, 
and deal in " scare heads " and " penny-dreadful " stories, 
but the leading papers are all comparatively clean, if not 
aggressively on the side of religion and morals. 

The Melbourne papers pay exceedingly little attention to 
religious matters, and seem to ape the " London Times " in 
the silent contempt that they visit upon anything or any- 
body that is not patronized by an earl or a lord at the very 
least. Their snobbishness is often spoken of by the people 
of Melbourne themselves, and it is not shared, I am glad to 
say, to any extent by the leading papers of Adelaide or Syd- 
ney. These are quite as good as newspapers, and far better 
as moral agencies in supporting and advancing the great 
religious movements of the day. 

In addition to the column of births, marriages, and 
deaths, a " memorial " column is published in many of the 
papers, and anybody can get his funereal lucubrations pub- 
lished at so much a line. I do not know but this is wise 
forethought on the part of the newspaper publishers. If 
their subscribers work off their poetic afflatus in some dog- 
gerel verses concerning a deceased relative, they are not so 
likely to deluge the editorial sanctum with poems on 
" Spring," " Love," and such threadbare subjects. I think 
some publisher could make his fortune by collecting the 
choicest of these verses under the title, " Funereal Poetry 
as She is Composed." Here is one that I have found, and it 
is quite equal to the average, neither better nor worse. I 
commend the use of the verb in the last line to all our bud- 
ding poets. 

" Farewell, Mother ; we did not know thy worth, 
But thou art gone, and now 'tis prized, 
Thus angels walked unknown on earth, 
But when they flew were recognized." 



OUTDOOR LIFE. 93 

Another one, for which a friend of mine vouches, read as 

follows : 

-i I heard that my Mother had met with a sprain, 
I left Ballarat by the 4.50 train, 
At Melbourne a cab took me quick to her side, 
But when I got there, alas, she had died ! " 

My friend suggests that no wonder the good lady departed 
this life before the arrival of a daughter who could perpe- 
trate such verse. 

After the breakfast and the paper have been disposed of, 
we will go out to see something of the national life, for 
there is a vast amount of outdoor life in Australia ; too 
much, I am told by those who know it best, for the young 
men and women, in consequence, often spend too little time 
at home. The fine climate makes very much of outdoor life 
possible and delightful ; and athletic sports have been 
carried to an extent that is not known in America or in 
England. This devotion to athleticism will, doubtless, pro- 
duce a line race of men physically. May this development 
not be gained at the expense of moral qualities which are 
vastly more important. 

As baseball is the national game in America, so football 
is the great national game of Australia. To be sure, cricket 
is played and famous elevens have beaten the best English 
cricketers. Australian oarsmen are renowned throughout 
the world, but football is the national game par excellence. 

The betting on these games, and especially the gambling 
on the horse races, are the worst features of outdoor life in 
Australia. It seems to me that I never saw the gambling 
spirit so rampant, even in England itself, as it is here. It 
certainly has not taken hold of the better classes in America 
as here. In some quarters there seems to be very little 
conscience about the matter. The races are patronized by 



94 THE CURSE OF AUSTRALIAN YOUTH. 

the governor-generals and the leading men in political life, 
and the protests which are raised by Christian people are 
sneered at by many of the papers as the feeble attempt of 
" sniveling parsons." A premier of one of the leading col- 
onies, himself not averse, as I found upon the steamer, to a 
chance in the " Calcutta Sweep," assures me that the spirit 
of gambling is the awful and growing curse of Australian 
youth. This testimony, certainly, is net from an unduly 
prejudiced source. 

Not only do the wealthy classes and the bookmakers bet r 
but the clerks and schoolboys and the ragged little boot- 
blacks themselves invest a shilling in the sweep. Immense 
prizes, sometimes as high as $50,000 each, tempt the cupidity 
of rich and poor alike. In fact, these horse-races are simply 
huge Louisiana lotteries legalized, and established in all the 
colonies, which must debauch the youth by the wholesale if 
they are allowed longer to exist. 

I have seen a sign over a very respectable looking house 
in Melbourne which read "Turf Adviser." It was not, as 
the uninitiated might suppose, a landscape gardener's office, 
or the establishment of one who gave instruction in regard 
to a model lawn, but of one who professed to have some 
special knowledge in regard to the races, and gave the 
unwary a supposed "tip" as to the winning horse. Such 
establishments, under one name or another, are very com- 
mon, and even in times of depression and suffering the horse 
races and the bookmakers are the last to feel the pinch. 
Every little town has its own races and its own betting- 
establishments, and the work of the Devil goes on in hun- 
dreds of different places at the same time. 

A very long Australian word, and one which for 
some time I could not understand the meaning of, is "total- 
isator." The papers are full of arguments for and against 



VIGOROUS LIFE IN THE CHURCHES. 95 

the " totalisator." The ministers denounce it from the 
pulpits, and the religious press score it in their columns, for 
it is simply a legalization of gambling, in which the govern- 
ment steps in and guarantees fair play ; that is, if there can 
be such a thing as "fair play" in gambling. At least the 
government guarantees that professional sharpers shall not 
"fleece" the immature little gamblers, but that they shall 
have an equal chance at the unrighteous winnings of the 
lottery. 

But it is pleasant to turn from the horse race and the 
gambling hell to the church ; and to record that the church 
life of Australia seems to me vigorous, genuine, and aggres- 
sive. Nowhere are earnest Christians more numerous ; no- 
where are the churches better managed or more liberally 
sustained. Some of the metropolitan churches are immense 
establishments, with lecture rooms and class rooms, large 
libraries and parlors, and offices for all kinds of religious, 
and benevolent enterprises. Some of them are practically 
theological seminaries as well, where the minister of the 
church, with some assistance perhaps from brother ministers^, 
instructs young men for their future work. 

The singing for the most part is magnificent. No thin 
warbling ; no operatic airs ; no display of organist and 
choir, such as is sometimes so painful in churches on our 
own side of the Pacific ocean; but hearty, whole-souled,, 
devotional, congregational singing obtains everywhere. 

The ministers, for the most part, are well-educated and 
able men, eloquent in defense of the truth, and outspoken 
for all righteousness. Especially in connection with the 
conventions for the Society of Christian Endeavor, which 
it was my happy privilege to attend during almost every 
day of my stay in Australia, was this devotional spirit most 
delightfully prominent. Never have I seen greater en- 



96 A' BRIGHT OUTLOOK. 

thusiasm or more intelligent piety ; or greater throngs, con- 
sidering the population to be drawn upon, or a more intense 
interest in the practical phases of religious life. And among 
all the happy weeks of my life I count those spent at the 
Australian Christian Endeavor Convention among the 
brightest and best. 

I need not here repeat the story of these delightful gath- 
erings, which, in fact, occupied all my time when in this 
land. With strong religious fervor and outspoken devo- 
tion ; with the vast material resources of the new continent 
to draw upon ; with the sturdy British character forming 
the basis of the population, I cannot help feeling that the 
outlook for this fair land materially, morally, and spiritually 
is as bright as for any country on all the face of the earth. 

There is no spot on earth where democracy is more ram- 
pant than in Australia. With all the talk about "home" 
(i. e. England) and all the sentimental love for the mother 
country, a very sturdy independence is cultivated, and a 
kind of individualism which is said by those who know best 
to tend to irreverence and disregard for authority. Young 
Australia is complained of by old Australia for its precocity 
and unpleasant development of beardless mannishness, just as 
young America is often twitted with the same fault by its 
elders. But I must say I have seen little of this priggish- 
ness among young Australians, and I have met many of 
them, and, as for young America, I think it has often been 
sadly maligned in this same way. 

For the secret ballot we have to thank Australia, for a 
simpler way of registering our deeds, which it is hoped will 
soon be universally adopted, and for other improvements hi 
municipal and civil government which naturally have origin- 
ated with this fresh and independent people. 

On the other hand, Australia has adopted many Ameri- 



UNFAIR REPRESENTATIONS. 97 

can ideas, and is very ready to credit every new invention 
and bright idea as a " Yankee notion," in Avhatever corner of 
the world it may have originated. But there are still many 
misunderstandings to be corrected and many prejudices to 
be overcome. 

There is a great need of a better understanding between 
these two English-speaking nations on both sides of the 
Pacific ocean. They have far more in common than most 
people believe. To understand these common character- 
istics, one must be in sympathetic relations to each. The 
newspapers on either side of the ocean seem to do their best 
to give a distorted and unworthy picture of life both in 
Australia and America. In our American papers how little 
do we see of real importance concerning the Australian 
colonies ? In the Australian, one may search the cable mes- 
sages for weeks for information concerning America and 
find little besides accounts of horrid murders, desperate 
suicides, and brutal prize fights, with here and there a dis- 
torted political item miscalled "news." 

It has been gravely said to me by a young Australian, 
with an air of knowing it all, that no decent man went into 
politics in America. He had full means of knowing what 
he was talking about, he said, and he was assured that no- 
body but scoundrels and " scalliwags " ever ran for a politi- 
cal office in the States. As I thought of our Christian gov- 
ernors and congressmen, senators and representatives whom 
I know are devout men and supporters of their churches, I 
could only smile at his ignorant conceit. 

And yet this young man doubtless represents many 
whose views of American life have been altogether gained 
through the opaque and distorting medium of the submarine 
cable. One of the American consuls in Australia told me 
that he was convinced that news was willfully distorted by 



98 ABSURDITIES OF MISINFORMATION. 

cable managers in Great Britain, for political effect, to lead 
the colonists to think that America is inhabited chiefly by 
cut-throats and assassins. This I cannot believe, however, 
though the kind of news that is most often cabled gives 
some color to the supposition. 

This same consul told me that on one occasion he saw a 
cable dispatch saying " that the Mexican Garcia and the 
black rascal Ormond, with a band of followers, had invaded 
Missouri, and had captured and sacked the town of In- 
dependence." He could not believe that this was true, since 
the town in question was more than one thousand miles 
from the Mexican border and the bandits would have to go 
through a thickly settled region to reach it. However, he 
had no means of disproving the assertion, but a few da} r s 
after came the news that the telegraphic cipher had been 
misinterpreted, and that it should have been interpreted to 
mean that a certain horse owned by the Duke, of Westmin- 
ster and the black filly Ormond, had captured all the sweep- 
stakes at a certain race in England. I do not suppose that 
the cable dispatches are often quite so absurdly mistrans- 
lated as in this case, but it would be strange if there were 
not numberless mistakes. 

I remember searching all through the London Times on 
one occasion, for news from my own country, and the only 
bit of information I could find was to the effect that a man 
had been arrested on the streets of Boston for kissing his 
wife in public. This absurd canard, the invention of an idle 
reporter, was accepted by " The Thunderer" as a solemn 
truth, and constituted the sole allowance of American news 
for that day. 

Said a young man to me, " I understand that all Ameri- 
can girls are given to chewing gum, and that they go around 
spitting upon the streets promiscuously.'' 1 He could hardly 



HIS IDEAS OF AMERICAN GIRLS. 



99 



be convinced when I told him that no American young lady 
I had ever seen was guilty of the latter heinous offense 
against good manners. He had probably seen some joke in 
an American paper about girls chewing gum, and I suppose 
that, from the same veracious source of information, he 
would make up his mind that the Chicago young ladies all 
wear ISTo. 14 boots ; and that every Boston girl is a spinster 
in spectacles, with a Greek lexicon under one arm and a 
Latin dictionary under the other. Very likely the views 
which our papers give of Australian life, whenever they 
take the pains to give any (which I fear is not very often), 
are equally distorted and fragmentary ; and if this chapter, 
in regard to the little things in Australian life and customs 
and manners, shall serve to introduce to any of my Ameri- 
can friends the country which I have come so highly to 
honor and respect, I shall be exceedingly glad. 




CHAPTER Y. 

AUSTRALIA THROUGH AMERICAN EYES. 

An Early Definition — A " Personally Conducted " Trip — A Peaceful Land 

— One of its Neighbors — Australia's Only Battle — The Eureka Stock- 
ade — Unwarlike "Weapons — Hot, Hotter, Hottest — Summer the Pre- 
vailing Season — Ragged and Tattered Trees — A Eucalyptus Country 
— Many "Botany Bays" — Imported Pests — A Pugnacious Little 
Briton — One of Australia's Expensive Problems — The Gentle, Peace- 
loving Bear — The Kangaroo and the Emu — The Kangaroo's Small 
Brother — The Laughing Jackass — A Land of Cities — Tales of Politi- 
cal Corruption — An Exploded Boom — Melbourne the Magnificent — 
Sydney the Picturesque — Adelaide the Lovely — Ballarat the Golden 

— Down in a Gold Mine — Getting Ready to Descend — In Motley 
Array — The Cage — Brave W omen — United We Drop — Suppose ! — 
Everything but Gold — A Brave Miner — Risking Life for a Friend — 
That Man was a Christian. 




STOEY is current here in Aus- 
tralia that an American geogra- 
phy was once published which 
contained this extraordinary piece 
of information concerning this 
vast continent. " Australia is a 
place to which England sent her 
convicts, some of whom have been 
converted and have become her 
leading citizens." It was in this 
same geography, doubtless, that 
England was described as a 
" small island off the coast of France." 

Absurd as such a description seems after one has visited 
these colonies with their thriving cities and bustling, cosmo- 
politan, modern life, which, for energy and vigor, is not 

(100) 



A COUNTRY LITTLE KNOWN TO US. 101 

surpassed anywhere in the world, it is typical of a vast deal 
of misinformation that prevails on both sides of the Pacific 
ocean concerning- the great countries on the opposite shores. 
Far too little of Australia is known in America, far too 
little of America is known in Australia. These two peoples 
of a common stock, a common language, and a common 
destiny, should know each other as they have not as yet 
begun to know each other ; and if these notes of a traveler 
in Australia shall do anything toward introducing these two 
branches of the English-speaking race to each other, the 
author will feel (as authors are accustomed to say in pre- 
faces) that " his work has not been altogether in vain." 

The area of Australia is almost exactly the same as of 
the United States, exclusive of Alaska, and about three- 
quarters as large as Europe. But do not be alarmed, dear 
reader, for I am not going into weary particulars, historical, 
geographical, biographical, or ethnological. I am only 
going to tell you of those things which impress a traveler in 
a journey through this new land ; in fact, to take you with 
me on a personalty conducted trip. You remember how this 
great island looks upon the map. It is roughly heart- 
shaped, but across the breadth of this heart is a journey of 
2,300 miles, while from the top to the bottom in its very 
narrowest length it is over 1,000 miles. 

It is not a country of vast and stupendous mountains, or 
mighty rivers, or belching volcanoes. It is eminently a 
peaceful, quiet, pastoral country. It has, to be sure, some 
fine mountains, and one or two large rivers, and some mag- 
nificent scenery, but there is more scenery which a tourist 
would seek in a single canton in Switzerland than in this 
whole continent of the southern seas. 

However, if Australia is not a Switzerland, it has a 
Switzerland at its doors, for one of the Australasian colonies, 



102 A WIDE DOORWAY. 

New .'Zealand, can boast of as magnificent mountains and 
glaciers, lakes and waterfalls as Switzerland, and precipices 
and fiords like those of Norway . I have said that this Aus- 
tralasian Switzerland was at the doors of Australia, and yet 
it is a good wide doorway ; for 1,200 miles of stormy ocean 
rolls between these islands. However, this is a country of 
magnificent distances and as New Zealand is the largest 
neighbor of Australia we may be pardoned for thinking 
■ of her as a near neighbor. 

As is 'becoming a peaceful, pastoral country, the history 
of this land since civilized man first came here to abide is 
far from warlike. In fact there is no nation on the face of 
the earth whose history has been so little stained with blood 
as this land. I visited the only battle-ground on Australian 
shores, the Eureka Stockade, so called, near Ballarat. This 
'battle-ground is not a Waterloo or a Gettysburg, by any 
means. It is simply the scene of a brisk skirmish between 
some riotous miners and the authorities, which resulted in 
few fatalities on either side. Nevertheless an heroic monu- 
ment marks the spot, and some unwarlike cannon, which 
probably could not be fired, show their muzzles from the 
historic hillock. Except for this brief skirmish the history 
•of the country has been absolutely bloodless. The Austra- 
lians have no one to fight and*no one to fear. No nation 
would think of sending an armed force to these shores, and 

• even if sent it would be routed in even quicker time than the 
Hessians who were sent to conquer the American colonies a 

• century ago. 

What is the climate of this country, do you ask, my curi- 
ous reader ? AVell, you might as Avell ask, " What is the 
climate of the United States." You will have to come down 
to particulars, and Ave shall ask you whether you desire to 
-know about the temperature of Texas or of North Dakota, of 



TALL AND TATTERED TREES. 103 

Florida or of Maine. Here, too, there are all climates and 
all temperatures. South Australia is hot, New South Wales 
is hotter, Queensland is hottest. Victoria has a more tem- 
perate climate and so has Tasmania, while some parts of the 
mountainous region of New Zealand are Arctic in their 
temperature. 

But take Australia throughout, we may say that it is a 
sunnier clime and far more summer-like than the same area 
of habitable North America. Summer is here the prevail- 
ing season, and when it is not summer time it is either late 
in the spring or early in the fall. 

The vegetation of Australia seems to a stranger to be 
rather meagre and monotonous ; not that anything will not 
grow which is planted and well watered, but indigenous 
trees are largely of the eucalyptus class, and though some 
of these are the tallest trees in the world, and magnificent 
specimens of treehood, yet, for the most part, they are 
scrawny and scraggy, and as they shed their bark, they 
have a peculiarly ragged and unkempt look, like street 
gamins whose clothes are hanging in tatters from their 
limbs. The botanists tell us that there are 150 different 
kinds of eucalyptus trees, most of which belong to Australia 
alone. 

But, after all, these are splendid trees for the country, 
and are, like most other inventions of Mother Nature, exactly 
adapted for the work which they have to do. They have 
very long tap roots, which suck up the moisture from a 
great depth, and their tough, leathery leaves fit them pecu- 
liarly for the dry climate. But though the eucalyptus is 
more largely represented in the native forest than an}>" other 
tree, yet it is not fair to say that the vegetation as a whole 
is of a dull, lifeless, and uninteresting character. 

Nowhere have I seen such gorgeous flowers ; no land can 



104 



BRILLIANT FLOWERING PLANTS. 



boast more magnificent gardens. Nature, seeming desirous 
of compensating the country for the usual lack of variety in 
deciduous trees, has fully made-up for this loss in the shrubs 
and flowering plants with which she has so plentifully car- 
peted the earth, especially during the sj>ring months, when 
sufficient moisture makes the blossoms possible. " Botany 




ABORIGINAL AUSTRALIAN. 



Bay" may be found in many places along the shores of 
Australia. The Wasatah is a most brilliant, showy, red 
flower which grows on a tall spike, while another famous 
native of New South Wales is the modest flannel flower, a 
beautiful relative of the edelweiss of Switzerland, which it 
much resembles. 

Many of these brilliant flowering plants are indigenous 
and others have been imported, such as the gorgeous golden 
gorze, and the equally golden cape-weed, which, however 
beautiful it looks when the sun shines upon it of a bright 



CAPE-WEED, SPARROWS, AND RABBITS. 105 

spring morning, is a pest as utterly detested by the farmers 
as the white weed in our northern meadows. By the way, 
when will people learn to experiment less recklessly with 
the products of other zones \ When will we learn the les- 
son, that for the most part, the trees and plants and birds 
and insects which God has settled in the land, are best 
adapted to that country, and that we are running great 
risks when we try to naturalize other citizens that are for- 
eign to these climes ? 

Not only has the cape-weed become an unutterable nui- 
sance, but the English sparrow is almost as great a pest in 
Australia as in our own country. Why could we not have 
been content to have left the chattering, mischievous, pug- 
nacious little bird at home, instead of spreading his ravages 
through two great continents. The gipsy moth seems to be 
a very harmless insect when you look at him with the dis- 
passionate eye of a naturalist, and yet what havoc he has 
made, and how many thousands of dollars has his unfortu- 
nate advent cost the goodly State of Massachusetts ! 

Could anything be more harmless in appearance than 
the timid rabbit, and yet the introduction of a few pair of 
these " feeble folk," has cost these colonies millions of pounds, 
and the end is not yet. How to exterminate the pests the 
colonists know not. They multiply faster than the hunter's 
gun and the hunter's dog can extirpate them. A vast re- 
ward has been offered to anyone who shall invent a poison 
potent enough to rid the country of them, but the reward 
has never been earned as yet. The only way to secure 
immunity from them is to build a " rabbit fence " around 
any particular field, sunk a foot or two below the surface of 
the ground under which the rabbits will not burrow. But 
to do this on any large scale is manifestly impossible, and 
the reward aforementioned still awaits the inventive Pas- 



106 RIDICULOUS ANIMALS. 

teur or Edison, who may discover the deadly rabbit extermi- 
nator. 

I have said that the geological and political history of 
Australia have been alike of a peaceful character, marked 
by no great upheavals of nature or of man. This gentle 
characteristic extends to the animal life of Australia as well, 
for there are no native animals of a fierce and savage nature, 
no lions or panthers, no wild cats or grizzly bears. The, 
kangaroo is the typical animal, and the emu is the typical 
bird, and they are found one on either side of the New 
South "Wales coat of arms, while both are dignified by a 
place on her postage stamps as well. There is, to be sure, a 
native bear, called the koala, but it is a mild and peace- 
loving animal that climbs sluggishly about at night on trees, 
in search of fruits and seeds. 

The kangaroo is the typical Australian animal, beyond 
all others, and with his smaller cousin, the wallaby, has 
afforded me no end of amusement as I have seen them in 
the well-kept zoological gardens of the country. "With their 
puny little forelegs which seem so utterly inadequate to the 
occasion, and which as often as they stand up on their hind 
legs droop down in a helpless, lackadaisical way, they are 
the very pictures of innocence and helplessness ; but I am 
told that a blow from the hind leg of an " old man " kanga- 
roo, or even a stroke of its powerful tail is not to be des- 
pised, and when angry and fearful for their young, they 
will fight in desperate fashion. The most stupid animal 
whose acquaintance it was ever my pleasure to make, is the 
wombat, a kind of dull, listless woodchuck, with a most 
uninteresting countenance, who burrows in the ground like 
his American cousin, but is not nearly so vivacious and 
enterprising. Among the birds is a very solemn-faced 
creature called the laughing jackass, who looks as though he 



A STUPID AND SARDONIC BIRD. 107 

had not an idea in his head or a friend in the world, as he 
sits perched all (lay immovable in his large cage in the 
gardens. But I am told that when in his native haunts, he 
is a different sort of a creature, and is gifted with a loud,, 
sardonic laugh, which is very startling as one passes his 
haunts. For just as the traveler has got by his habitat, this 
ironical, chuckling laugh bursts out as though some demon 
was rejoicing over the traveler's progress to the City of 
Destruction. 

Much of the human life of Australia, aside from the 
Aborigines, is found in the large cities. In fact, far too large 
a proportion, as I have already remarked, of our Australian 
friends live in the cities, and too small a proportion for the 
best and truest prosperity of the country cultivate the soil. 
This fact is acknowledged and mourned over by thoughtful 
Australians everywhere. If Paris is France, much more is 
Melbourne Yictoria, and Sydney is New South Wales, and 
Adelaide is South Australia. In fact, not far from 50 per 
cent, of the people live in cities, and nearly that percentage 
of the whole population is found in these great leading cities 
or their immediate environs. 

The usual tales are told in the papers about political cor- 
ruption and incompetence of premier and councilors and 
members of the Colonial Parliament. I have learned to put 
very little confidence in these newspaporial wails about the 
decadence of legislation and legislators. I have heard so 
many of them in my own country that I am inclined to dis- 
count those that I read in any other. Like the man who 
was not frightened by ghosts because he had seen so many 
of them, I am not greatly alarmed when I see the opposition 
papers telling the country that it is going to rack and ruin 
as fast as the other party can carry it. 

However, there have doubtless been some sad revelations 



108 .AN INDOMITABLE PEOPLE. 

of late in political life, and Victoria especially is suffering 
terribly from an exploded " boom." Three years since, so 
the Victorians tell me, it was supposed that the golden gates 
of prosperity were wide open for all the colonies, and would 
never be closed, and that all that any one had to do was to 
enter in and help himself to as many millions as he was 
smart enough to grab. Real estate went up to a fabulous 
price, wildcat schemes were entered into with a recklessness 
worthy of South Sea Bubble years. Many men in each 
large city were supposed to be veritable descendants of 
Croesus and whatever they touched, it was thought, would 
turn to shining gold. But the inevitable crash came which 
always follows an extravagant boom, and for the last two 
years Victoria and ISTew South Wales, especially the former, 
have been suffering sadly from the collapse. 

However, this depression must be merely temporary. 
With the magnificent country to be developed behind the 
large cities, with an indomitable people, and English pluck 
and perseverance to work upon, there is no doubt concern- 
ing the future history of these colonies. As it is, they 
have made marvelous progress during the last forty years, 
for it is only since gold was discovered in 1851 that the 
great future of Australia has been assured. Within that 
time Melbourne has grown from an insignificant village 
to a vast and beautiful city. The word "magnificent" is 
scarcely too large a word to be used in describing this me- 
tropolis. Some of its streets are equal to the best that can 
be found in Paris or London, New York or Philadelphia, 
and, take it throughout, it has a cleaner, fresher, and more 
wholesome appearance than either of these cities. Its public 
buildings are massive and imposing, its store's are spacious, and 
much of the architecture of its principal thoroughfare, Col- 
lins street, can scarcety be matched elsewhere in the world. 



A CITY OF HOMES. 



109 



Sydney is not so well laid out as Melbourne, for, like 
Topsy, it "just growed" instead of being planned carefully 
by architects and surveyors ; but it is a more picturesque 
city by reason of its irregularity, and in most respects fully 
as interesting as Melbourne. 

Adelaide combines city and country in a charming way, 




IN ONE OP MELBOURNE'S PARKS. 



and is surrounded on all sides by a wide park filled with 
beautiful trees and brilliant shrubbery. Beyond this park- 
enclosed area are the suburban cities and villas, and back of 
all is a lovely range of green hills that encircles the city 
most lovingly round about. Adelaide seemed to me pre- 
eminently a city of homes, and the religious influences are 
strong and abiding. 

Another remarkable city that I visited is Ballarat, the 
center of the gold-mining industries of Australia ; or at least 



110 NOT A TYPICAL MINING TOWN. 

one of the centers, for Bendigo, which I did not visit, is 
equally famous in its way as a golden city. 

All my preconceived notions of a mining town were 
rudely destroyed by Ballarat, for, instead of belching chim- 
neys and barren hillsides, bedraggled streets and dirty 
houses, such as I have always associated in my imagination 
with a mining town, I found here one of the handsomest of 
modern cities with splendid streets, tree-lined and statue- 
adorned ; tine public buildings and business blocks, and a 
charming residential quarter where some of the most refined 
and hospitable people on the face of the earth have their 
homes. But despite these delightful surroundings, one sees 
at a glance that Ballarat is a city of mines. Huge heaps of 
yellow earth, almost mountainous in their size, surround the 
city in every direction, and these show where the mines 
have been and in many cases still are worked. From some 
of these fabulous sums of gold have been extracted, and the 
supply seems practically inexhaustible, for, however far the 
miners have gone, they have not found the end of the gold- 
bearing quartz. 

Let us go down together, dear reader, into this dark hole 
in the ground, for we will never have a better opportunity 
to see a gold mine. As we go into the office of the com- 
pany to don our underground costumes, we see a great pile 
of apparent golden ingots, — plaster representations of the 
gold that has been taken out of this mine during the last 
three or four years. These bars are piled up under a glass 
case, and represent hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth 
of yellow metal which has come out of this one hole in the 
ground. 

But we will not linger on the surface, for here are the 
clothes that we are to put on, a motley array of all sorts 
and sizes : battered hats, ragged coats, trousers that reach 



IN PICTURESQUE RAGS. 



Ill 



only half way below the knee, and boots hopelessly run 
down at the heels ; but no matter, for we are not going into 
polite society for the next few hours. 

So picturesque, however, is our rig, that we pause to have 
our photographs taken before descending into the bowels of 
Mother Earth. Then we find the entrance to the mine and 
the cage waiting to carry us down. It is a pokerish looking 




READY FOR THE DESCENT INTO A GOLD MINE. 

hole, indeed, and requires some little nerve on the part of 
the ladies of our party. But I have always noticed that a 
genuine woman, though she may run from a snake, and pos- 
sible give a little scream at the sight of a mouse, always 
braces up when her genuine courage is required. And first 
of all, the ladies step upon the platform of the cage and 
stow themselves away in the smallest possible compass, four 
going down at a time. A cord is passed around them, tying" 
them all together, so that not only united they stand, but 
united they drop down into the lower regions which yawn 



112 DARKNESS THAT MAY BE FELT. 

beneath them. The signal is given and down we go. It is 
an awful plunge into the depths of the earth. Light and 
hope we seem to leave above us, and a pitchy blackness that 
may be felt is all that seems to be below us. However, we 
have not time for any very long-continued dismal reflections, 
for in less than three minutes we are at the bottom of the 
shaft, and picking our way gingerly over sharp pieces of 
quartz, and through pools of muddy water, following our 
guide who goes before us with his flickering candle at 
which we have all lighted our own torches. 

If not heroic, there is something picturesque and weird 
in the sight of a file of men and women stumbling along in 
a narrow passage a thousand feet below the surface, lighted 
only by a few gleams that serve to make the darkness visi- 
ble. Even the stoutest hearted cannot help thinking: 
" Suppose the fire damp should explode ! " " Suppose the 
flood gate should give way and pour their whelming floods 
of water into this hole while we are here ! " " Supposing 
these wooden supports that wall us in should yield to the 
tremendous pressure above them and collapse, who would 
carry the tale of the imprisoned Yankees in a Ballarat gold 
mine ? " 

However, none of these things occur or are very likely to 
occur, for the utmost precaution is taken, and I imagine that 
life is quite as safe in this underground hole as it is on 
Broadway or Washington street. After stumbling around 
in the different passages for an hour or two, looking for 
nuggets which never appear, and searching the walls dili- 
gently for specks of gold which we can never see, we return 
again to the shaft that will take us up to air and sunlight, 
convinced that about the only thing one cannot find in a 
gold mine is gold. 

Yet all this innocent-looking white quartz which seems 



'"HEAVY TO GET AND LIGHT TO HOLD." 113 

to contain not even a scintillation of the yellow metal, is 
charged with it, and when it is crushed, flooded with water, 
and strained through blankets, and treated with quicksilver 
whose deft fingers pick out every little particle of the pre- 
cious ore, it is found to be extremely rich in that commodity 
for which so many men are willing to make slaves of them- 
selves all their lives long. 

The miners themselves, however, get no extravagant 
wages; though they work in gold and for gold, they can 
only daily line their pockets with about $2.50 worth of the 
metal for which they delve. So true is it in gold mines as 
in every other industry, and every other effort moral, spirit- 
ual, and material ; " other men labor and we are entered 
into their labors." 

" That man must have been a Christian," said our guide,. 
as we were going up from the bottom of the mine to the 
daylight again. 

" What man ? " we inquired. 

"Why, the fellow that saved his chum's life in one of the 
mines a little while ago." ' 

" Tell us all about it," we said, and before we got up to 
daylight we had time to hear the brief and graphic story. 
Two miners were recently going up the shaft together in a 
bucket, when one of them accidentally fell off. They were 
hurrying up to get out of the way of four charges of rend- 
rock which had been put into the drilled holes to blast away 
a portion of the wall of the mine. The fuse had been 
lighted, and these men, scrambling into the bucket, had 
given the signal to be hoisted up, when, as I said, one of 
them fell out. Quick as thought his brave companion gave 
the signal to lower the bucket again. 

It had gone some twenty or thirty feet only, and the 
man who fell from it, though stunned and bruised, was not 



114 



A HERO OP THE MINE. 



killed. His companion felt around in the awful darkness 
for the charges of rendrock in order to pull them out and 
prevent the explosion. He found three of them, but the 
fourth he could not find in the darkness and confusion of the 
moment. He had but a few seconds to work for the fuse 
was burning toward the explosive with frightful rapidity. 

Finding that he could not lay his hand upon the last 
charge, he drew his senseless companion into a niche in the 
rock, shielded him as far as possible from the flying frag- 
ments, and waited the dreadful moment of the explosion. 
Was ever a man placed in a position of more awful ex- 
pectancy ? Did ever a braver soul court death for the sake 
of saving a fellow-man ? The fearful explosion came. The 
mine was filled Avith suffocating fumes, the rocks flew in 
every direction, but, strange to say, neither of these men 
were killed. They were bruised and cut, and much shaken 
nervously, as can be imagined, but the brave deliverer was 
able to crawl to the bucket again when the explosion was 
over and to carry his wounded friend with him, and both 
were hoisted into God's sunlight again. 

With all our hearts we agree with our guide's remark: 
" That man must have been a Christian ! " 




CHAPTER VI. 



THE CRUISE OF THE GHINGTU— A^. INTERESTING VOYAGE 
IN STRANGE COMPANY — IN THE GOLD FIELDS OF 
AUSTRALIA. 

Beginning Our Log-book — Mrs. Pilgrim's Resolve — The Ghingtu — A 
Unique and Unusual Journey — Our Steamer — Our Stewards — 
"Loast Beef," " Olange Flittels" and "Lice Cakes" — Preparing for 
Hot Weather — Our Fellow Passengers — Life in the Steerage — Mr. 
Ah See and his Wives — Mrs. Ah See Number One — Photographing 
the Family — The Ruler of the Roost — The Black Fellows — Ce- 
lestials Returning Home — Taking Home Their Own Bones — The 
Chinaman at Dinner — A Race of Squatters — The Fan-tan "Layout" 
— Chinese Passion for Gambling — Within the Barrier Reef — "White 
Man, He too Salt" — Glittering Gold Fields — How Gold was Discov- 
ered in Australia — Nash and His "Find" — "Welcome Strangers" — 
Gold on Brogans — The Romance of the Morgan Mine — A Visit from a 
Native Bushman — "Backy, Backy, Backy" — White Ant Hills. 

start fairly with our log-book 
Ave must tell you that the 
Ghingtu sails from Melbourne to 
Hong Kong, but that we did not 
join her until she had plowed her 
way for a thousand miles along 
the waters of the Australian 
coast, and had reached Brisbane, 
the capital of Queensland. 

Mrs. Pilgrim had declared 
that nothing would induce her to 
go a mile by water that could be 
traversed by land. So we had traveled by rail from Ade- 
laide to Melbourne, from Melbourne to Sydney, from 
Sydney to Brisbane, a long eighteen hundred miles in all ; 
had attended most enthusiastic and long-to-be-remembered 

(115) 




11G NOT AN EVERY-DAY JOURNEY. 

Christian Endeavor Conventions in all these cities; and on 
the afternoon of October 22 were ready to embark on the 
trim and staunch Chingtw, "the magnificent steamer," as 
the newspaper advertisements called her, of the China Navi- 
gation Company. 

I should hardly term her "magnificent'' 1 but she was an 
exceedingly comfortable vessel, and for three weeks afforded 
us a very restful and pleasant home after the labors of six 
Aveeks of continuous convention-going. 

Now before us is a voyage worth taking indeed. None 
of your every-day trips across the Atlantic that you can 
make in the fraction of a week; none of your common 
jaunts across the long ferry between San Francisco and 
Hong Kong; but a unique and unusual journey is this 
within the Great Barrier Reef, and through the marvelous 
Malay Archipelago, and the many seas and straits which 
form the water-way between two of our five continents. 

Here is a new sensation for the blase traveler ; a journey 
at which every scribbling voyager from the time of Colum- 
bus has not had a hack. Here is a trip over unruffled 
seas and on an even keel, such a trip as one frequently reads 
about in flaming descriptions of rival steamboat lines, but 
very rarely experiences after one has taken passage on one 
of the aforesaid rival steamships. 

Before we get out of Moreton bay, into which the Bris- 
bane river debouches and which is the point of our embarka- 
tion, let us take a look at the Chingtu, our floating home for 
the next three weeks. It is a long, low-built, somewhat 
rakish-looking steamer, with a huge black smoke-stack, a 
large amount of awning to ward off the rays of the fierce 
tropical sun, and large steerage accommodations for John 
Chinaman, who always extensively patronizes this line, as he 
o-oes back and forth to and from his native land. 



ON BOARD THE " CHINGTU." 117 

Being built largely for freight, the first-class passenger 
accommodations are somewhat limited, but they are quite 
sufficient for the passenger traffic of this remote corner of 
the world, and they make up in quality what they lack in 
quantity. Everything is exquisitely neat, the table is abun- 
dant and excellent, and the service of the Chinese stewards 
leaves nothing to be desired. Quick, observant, quiet, cat- 
like in their tread, these China boys are the perfection of 
ship servants. 

All our sailors, as well as cooks, waiters, and stewards 
are Chinese or Malays, and even the librarian of the Chingtu 
is "Number One Boy" as his fellow-stewards call him. At 
the table the watchful "Boy" who is detailed to look after 
our comfort stands at our elbow to replenish our tumbler, or 
to fill our teacup, or to pass us the toast whenever our empty 
cup or plate suggests any lack, and gently to insinuate the 
bill of fare under our nose when we pause for a moment in 
our gastronomic efforts. 

Order for "loast beef" and "olange nittels" are continu- 
ally sent back to the cook in the galley, and I know of 
a small boy who finds it very hard to repress a snicker when 
at the breakfast table the frequent order for "lice cakes" 
is heard. 

In every way we are reminded that the ship is built for 
tropical weather. The double awning over the promenade 
deck, through which even the awful sun-glare of Northern 
Australia finds it hard to pierce ; the heavy Indian punkahs 
over each table, which, during the meals, are swung by 
invisible coolies ; the hard beds on which are no blankets or 
spreads or even sheets, all tell us to make up our minds for 
hot weather. And well we may, for the cruise of the 
Chingtu is almost wholly within the tropics. 

The only drawback (and in this imperfect world there 



118 THE AH SEES. 

must be some drawback even to such a summer voyage as 
this) is the continuous heat. Not that it is remarkably in- 
tense at any one moment, but it is so unremitting and ener- 
vating that one longs for an ice palace and a toboggan slide 
many times every day. Eighty-five degrees in the morning, 
and eighty-seven degrees at noon, and eighty-five degrees 
again at sunset, and eighty-four degrees at midnight, when 
continued day after day, are calculated to reduce the pity 
one has always felt for the Esquimau in his snow hut. 

Now let us take a look at our fellow passengers of the 
Chingtu. Not the Europeans with their continental dress 
and their chimney-pot hats and their calf -skin boots : Ave 
will not waste our time upon such common people (by the 
way, your point of view makes all the difference in the 
world as to who the common people are), but we will look 
on the afterdeck and on the poop for the second and third- 
class passengers, if we would forage in fresh fields and 
human pastures new. 

There on the poop deck we shall find Mr. Ah See with 
his two wives and his four children ; the prosperous Chinese 
merchant of Sydney, who has made his little pile in Aus- 
tralia, and is going home to spend it in Canton, where he 
will be a great and wealthy man among his almond-eyed 
confreres. 

Mr. Ah See is fat and good-natured, and seems very fond 
of the four little Ah Sees, even though two of them are 
girls. Like the model husband that he seems to be, he has 
one of the children in his arms most of the time, even 
though he has two Avives to care for them. 

But "Tommy" and "Fleddy," and "Maly" and 

" Eliza " are all ver}^ nearly of an age, and are quite bright 

and pert enough to do credit to their English names. Mrs. 

Ah See Number One is a stout Avoman AA r ith a pleasant, 



''TAME BLACKS.'.' 119 

motherly face, slant eyes, and two huge shell rings in her 
ears, Avhile her hair is done up in a most fearful and wonder- 
ful fashion, quite equal to the coiffure of an American belle 
when chignons were in fashion a few years since. 

She evidently " rules the roost " in the Ah See household, 
Avhile Mrs. Ah See Number Two is like an older daughter, 
though more submissive and bidable than some elder daugh- 
ters whom I know. 

When -I desire to take their pictures, Mrs. Number One 
steps forward, takes little Eliza from Mrs. Number Two, who 
is giving the baby her morning meal from the maternal 
fount, and is ready to pose before the kodak in her appro- 
priate place as the rightful head of the family and the 
mother of all the children ; and, in a certain sense, of all 
the other wives as well. 

Here, also, are three " black fellows " among the third- 
class passengers who are going to Port Darwin with a cattle- 
drove, and from thence into the uninhabited wilds of South 
Australia, Quiet, stolid, undemonstrative fellows are these 
*' tame blacks," who seem to care for nothing but to be 
stretched on the hatchway all day long, and to sit up long 
enough to eat an enormous plate of beef and potatoes and 
cabbage three times a day. Their skins are jet black ; such 
a depth of lustrous blackness as I have never seen except in 
Australian aborigines ; their eyes are as black as their skins, 
and glow like two stars in a setting of alabaster ; while their 
woolly hair that stands up on end is as black as everything 
else about them excepting the whites of their eyes. 

Their faces are not vicious, however, and they make 
faithful shepherds and herdsmen who will defend their mas- 
ters against their ferocious brethren, who still infest the 
northern portion of Australia. 

Interesting as are our second and third-class fellow pas- 



120 OUR FRIENDS IN THE STEERAGE. 

sengers, our friends in the steerage are more interesting still, 
for here we have John Chinaman, in all his heathen unlove- 
liness, to be sure, but at the same time, in all his picturesque 
barbarity. Here are some fifty or sixty Mongolians going 
back to China once more. More than Mecca to the Moham- 
medan, more than Paris to the Frenchman, more than 
London to the cockney, is China to the Chinaman. His 
cupidity will tempt him to go away, but nothing can per- 
suade him to stay away from his beloved land, and every 
returning ship is loaded with returning Celestials. If, by 
any mischance, he dies away from home, his bones are 
never allowed to rest in peace except in the soil of the Flow- 
ery Kingdom. 

So it happens that many of our passengers on the 
Chingtu are old men, decrepit and feeble, toothless and 
almost blind, who are evidently taking their bones home for 
burial, thus getting a last glimpse of their native land and 
saving the exjDense of an embalming surgeon at the same 
time. 

But others among our passengers are stalwart, lusty 
young Celestials, with neatly-braided pig-tails coiled under 
their caps or thrust into a side-pocket of their white blouses. 

It is an unending source of enjoyment to go into the 
steerage at any hour of the day or night, a free play-house, 
where the actors are all entirely unconscious of histrionic 
effort, and thus attain the perfection of good acting. 

To go down the companion-way which separates the 
cabin passengers from the steerage, is a swift descent from 
Europe to China, and at meal-times the visit is always espe- 
cially interesting. In their very impromptu meals, first a 
big wicker basket of rice, the great staple of Chinadom 
everywhere, is brought in from the galley and set down 
anywhere on the steerage deck. Then a small dish of meat 



RICE AND CHOPSTICKS. 121 

soused in plenty of gravy follows, then another dish of 
boiled greens and a bottle of Chinese wine is set on the deck, 
and dinner is served. A dozen bare-legged Chinamen, clad 
in shiny black waterproof blouses, squat around these four 
dishes and prepare for business. Each has a china bowl and 
two chopsticks in his hand. First he fills his bowl to the 
brim with boiled rice, and then how he makes the chop- 
sticks fly ! Putting the rim of the bowl close up to his lips, 
he shovels his mouth full of rice with his rapid little sticks. 
When it can hold no more he pauses for a moment for 
breath and for mastication, and then picks up most dexter- 
ously a morsel of meat and a wad of greens which he crowds 
into the interstices of the rice-filled cavern which he calls his 
mouth. 

After munching this mixture with evident satisfaction 
for a minute or two, he again raises the rice bowl to his lips, 
crams the cavern again with the utmost alacrity, adds a 
little spice in the way of meat and greens, and enjoys an- 
other rapturous period of mastication until that, too, is dis- 
posed of. It is wonderful how long these fellows can squat 
on their haunches. A position which would cramp our mar- 
row bones in half a minute they will maintain throughout a 
long meal, apparently with the utmost ease and composure. 

Just beyond the dinner party is a circle of gamblers 
around the fan-tan " lay out " ; for John is an inveterate 
gambler. He will work like a slave for years in some 
foreign land, save and scrape and hoard and live on next to 
nothing ; and then gamble away all his little hoard on his 
journey back to China. First, he will bet all his money, 
then wager his clothes, and then his wife and children, 
while, if his soul were at his own disposal, I have no doubt 
he would wager that in his passion for gambling. 

Squatting on their haunches in a corner of the steerage 



122 WITHIN THE BARRIER REEF. 

deck is another circle of Chinese gamblers, throwing dice 
and playing cards, with a dexterity acquired only by long 
experience. They are smoking cigarettes, or curious pipes, 
with minute bowls, which when not in use they tuck behind 
their ears, until they desire another whiff. 

But it must not be thought that all the passengers of the 
Chingtu are gamblers. A traveler in foreign lands is only 
in duty bound to describe the unusual and picturesque, and 
he need not waste his space upon the manly but everyday 
officers of the Chingtu, or the very pleasant, but quite un- 
note worthy Englishmen and Australians, Americans and 
Germans and Frenchmen who make up her small first-class 
passenger list. 

Now it is quite time that we turn our thoughts from the 
little world of the Chingtu to the larger world around us. 

We were just steering out of Moreton bay, were we not, 
when we went below to look at our strange assortment 
of passengers % 

The water is smooth and glassy, and over just such an 
unruffled sea the captain tells we are likely to sail for more 
than two weeks, for, during the first week, we shall keep 
well within the Great Barrier reefs which effectually prevent 
the rude Atlantic waves from buffeting our progress ; and 
during the second week, the many islands off the coast of 
Northern Australia and the Malay Archipelago act as break- 
waters for our course, so that, practically, with the exception 
of the last three days, the whole cruise of the Chingtu is. 
within landlocked seas. This assurance is a great delight to 
some of our company, for even the most indifferent sailor 
cannot fail to enjoy such a trip as this. 

Those sunbaked, blistered mountains on our left mark 
the coast of Queensland, and what a tremendous colony it 
is! More than five times the size of Great Britain and Ire- 



WHITE MAN, HE TOO SALT. 



125 



jMmS:. 



land, the geographies tell us, and we can well imagine that 
they are not exaggerating the truth, as we sail on, day after 
day, day after day, in 
vain effort to get beyond 
the northern point of 
Cape York. 

Far off yonder in 
Northern Australia are 
unexplored wilds and 
savage black men, who 
would not only take 
pleasure, so our captain 
tells us, in flaying us 
alive, but in eating a 
good tender Yankee after 
he has been well flayed 
and cooked. These blacks 
prefer Chinamen, how- 
ever, so he assures us, to 
Yankees or to people of 
European extraction of any kind, for they are much 
"fresher" says our epicurean aboriginal. "White man, he 
too salt," is the verdict of this fastidious savage. Well, we 
will rejoice in our saline characteristics, for if we should be 
cast ashore on this inhospitable coast, salt, as is its nature, 
may preserve us. 

On the left or Australian side, as we steam northward, 
headland succeeds headland; on the right, island succeeds 
island, and so all day long and all the days long, we glide on 
with never enough of a pitch or a roll to disturb the most 
sensitive stomach. 

Early in its history the government of Queensland 
offered rewards, varying from a thousand to five thousand 




ABORIGINAL AUSTRALIAN. 



126 CAPRICIOUS FORTUNE. 

dollars for the discovery of payable gold fields. As can 
easily be imagined, this offer, combined with the certain 
wealth which a great gold mine would assure, set many men 
to searching with all their eyes over the hot plains of 
Queensland. But fortune is proverbially capricious with 
the gold seeker, and it so happened that not one of these 
scientific gold hunters, but a poor vagabond, named Nash, 
who toward the end of 1867 was wandering about in an aim- 
less sort of way in the neighborhood of Gympie, about 130 
miles from Brisbane, found "an auriferous region of great 
extent," as the Australian histories put it. In other words, 
he had struck gold and struck it rich. In a day or two his 
empty pockets were heavier by several thousand dollars 
worth of gold than when he made his great "find." At first 
he set to work to gather it all in for himself, but his gold 
field was near a traveled road, and he was frequently 
obliged to crouch among the bushes until the distant foot- 
steps told him that the departing traveler was far on his 
way. Then he would go to work with feverish haste to 
scrape together a few more shining flakes of the precious 
metal. 

At length, however, he found that he could not keep his 
precious gold field all to himself any longer, and, going to 
the nearest town of Maryborough, he proclaimed his discov- 
ery, and received his reward. 

As can easily be imagined, a rush at once took place to 
Gympie, and one of the early gold birds found a most re- 
markable worm very near the surface of the ground, in the 
shape of a nugget of pure gold that weighed nearly a hun- 
dred pounds. 

Even this nugget, however, is eclipsed by several that 
have been found in the colony of Victoria, such as the 
"Welcome Stranger," found in 1869, which actually 



WELCOME NUGGETS FOR WEARY MINERS. 127 

weighed in the scales 190 pounds, and was worth about 
forty thousand dollars. Besides the " Welcome Stranger " 
was the " Welcome " nugget, found in 1858, and only smaller 
by six pounds than the great golden lump I have already 
described, while still another, found in 1853, weighed almost 
132 pounds. 

" Welcome strangers," indeed, were all these nuggets to 
the weary and often discouraged miners. But those discov- 
eries were made in the golden age of Australian gold min- 
ing. A friend of mine who lived in Ballarat during this 
golden age, tells me that frequently, when a boy, he has 
borrowed the muddy boots of the miners after their return 
from a day's work in the alluvial gold fields, for the sake of 
scraping the mud off their dirty brogans ; and that he has 
frequently scraped five shillings worth of gold from a single 
pair of boots. 

He was an honest, truthful man, moreover, who told me 
this story, and he would not be guilty of presuming on the 
gullibility of a credulous Yankee. So my readers may 
accept his astounding story as absolute truth. 

But to return to the Queensland gold fields. The 
romance of the Morgan mine eclipses all the rest. In 1858, 
a young squatter bought from the government a section of 
640 acres near Rockhampton. When he came to "squat," 
however, he found that his selection was a barren, rocky hill, 
and that it was quite useless for agricultural purposes. So 
he thought himself very lucky when he found three brothers 
named Morgan, who would take his unprofitable purchase 
off his hands for about three thousand dollars. Hugging- his 
precious three thousand dollars, he left that part of the coun- 
try forever, shaking its unproductive dust from his feet. 

But the Morgan brothers found, that though they could 
not raise cabbages among the dirty gray rocks of their new 



128 A PARCHED AND HOWLING WILDERNESS. 

purchase, they could get out of them something vastly more 
valuable, for in every cart load of the rock there was more 
than one hundred dollars' worth of gold ; in fact, they found 
that they had on their hands the richest gold mine ever dis- 
covered in the history of the world. 

A year or two after this the hill was sold for forty mil- 
lions of dollars, and already dividends to the amount of 
nearly fifty millions of dollars have been paid by the Mor- 
gan mine, and still there are " millions in it." 

But to skip from shore to sea again. As the Chingtit- 
makes her slow and tortuous way along the coast, avoiding 
sunken reefs, dodging islands, and threading intricate pas- 
sages, we see very little of human life except that which our 
polyglot and cosmopolitan passenger list contains. For hun- 
dreds of miles there is no white settlement, only a parched 
and howling wilderness, into which it is not safe for a white 
man to penetrate unless with a strong guard. Here and 
there a bush-fire shows us the location of a native encamp- 
ment, and once we descried on the water horizon a black 
speck which seemed to be moving nearer. Anything 
unusual at sea attracts attention, and it was not long before 
half a dozen opera glasses w T ere trained upon the spot. The 
speck soon resolved itself into a native canoe, and the canoe 
was seen to contain four naked blacks. Their craft was 
simply a hollo wed-out log pointed at the ends, with a long 
outrider which prevented it from rolling over as it certainly 
would have done otherwise. As the blacks came nearer, Ave 
saw that they were bearing down upon our ship and pad- 
dling with all their might. When they got within ear shot 
they all lifted up their voices and cried : " backy," " backy," 
" backy " (tobacco). 

But the Chingtu majestically kept on her way. The pit- 
iful cry, " backy," " backy," " backy," became fainter and 



THE CONQUERING ANGLO-SAXON. 



129 



fainter, the log canoe faded into a speck again, and the speck 
vanished altogether. 

What a perfect type, I said to myself, of the vanishing 
bushmen in the presence of the majestic white race. What 




"BACKY," "BACKY." 

the feeble little dug-out is to the full-powered ocean steamer, 
so is the remnant of this aboriginal nation to the all-conquer- 
ing whites. As the Chingtu contemptuously leaves the 
canoe in the distance without even slackening speed to listen 
to the appeal of its occupants, so the contemptuous English- 
speaking races in all parts of the world leave their colored 
brethren behind or spurn them from their presence. As 
" backy " was the one corrupted English word which these 
black fellows seemed to know, so the vices of the dominant 
race first become known and assimilated. As the canoe van- 
ished into the hazy distance while the Chingtu held strongly 
on her appointed cruise, so the black races are disappearing, 



130 THROUGH ALBANY PASS. 

while the Anglo-Saxons keep steadily on their way, conquer- 
ing and to conquer. 

But while we are musing about these black fellows, the 
Chingtu has been plowing her serpentine way along the 
much-indented coast of this huge colony. 

We have left the sandy reach where Capt. Cook more 
than a hundred years ago beached his famous ship, the 
Endeavor, which had been sadly disabled in trying to find 
an entrance through the Barrier Reef ; we have steamed for 
a whole week since leaving Brisbane, along these unending 
shores ; and now, just seven days from the start, the Chingtu 
cleaves her way through Albany Pass, a narrow strait 
between two verdure-clad islands, at the very tip end of 
Northern Australia. 

On either hand as we went through Albany Pass, we 
saw hundreds of curious red mounds, which at first we took 
for decaying tree stumps, so regular and symmetrical were 
they. But on examining them more closely through our 
glasses we found that they were white ant hills, and a most 
singular appearance they gave the land, as though it had 
been hastily cleared by settlers who had left the stumps 
about four feet high to rot away at their leisure. 

Soon after passing through Albany strait, the gaunt, 
spectral yards of a four-masted, square-rigged ship appeared 
on the horizon, fixed and motionless as they have been for 
five years past, ever since the good ship Volga struck on the 
coral reef and sunk in a few fathoms of water, leaving her 
yards and masts above the waves, a sad monument to the 
power of the unseen foe beneath. 

Then a few more hours of sailing and we drop anchor in 
the roadstead of Thursday Island at the northern extremity 
of Cape York, and at this safe anchorage, the first part of 
the cruise of the Chingtu has come to an end. 



CHAPTEE VII. 

THE CRUISE OF THE CHINGTU. — CONTINUED. 

All the Days of the Week — A Convenient Nomenclature — A Diet of Sea 
Worms — Trade in Bloodsuckers — Reminiscences of My Boyhood — A 
Hideous Delicacy — The Pearl Fishery — Plums in the Pudding — The 
Pearl Diver's Equipment — A Short but not a Merry Life — A Baking 
Day and Steamy Night — The Aborigines — In the Celebes Sea — The 
Connecticut of the South Sea — The Nutmeg at Home — The Possibili- 
ties of a Ball of Twine — How the Bride Wore the Trousers — Euro- 
pean Clothes and Civilization — A Snake Story — An Unwelcome 
Guest — Dislodging his Serpentship — A Battle with a Python — The 
Spicy Breezes — The Noble Work of the Missionary — How the Chief 
Took the Census — At His Wit's End — A Shrewd Rajah — Some 
Passengers — Some Members of the Feline Tribe — The Tale of Tor- 
toise-shell Tommy. 




>HUBSDAY ISLAND is the only 
island in the little archipelago to 
the north of Australia that con- 
tains any considerable settlement 
of Europeans, but the other days 
of the week are not neglected by 
any means, for there is Friday 
Island and Saturday Island, Sun- 
day Island and Monday Island, 
Tuesday Island and Wednesday 
Island ; and the Chingtu steams- 
by nearly all of them in going in 
or out of Thursday Island harbor. 

A convenient method of nomenclature this, which we 
would commend to geographers who have lands to name, if 
there remain any new lands to be discovered. Then, when 

(131) 



132 NAMING COUNTRIES FROM THE CALENDAR. 

the days of the week have been exhausted, they would find 
an almost unfailing source of supply in the days of the 
month, as, for instance, the " Fifth of November," and the 
" Twenty -third of July," and " January Eighteenth." 

Then the hours of the day might be resorted to, and we 
should read upon our maps " Four O'clock Island," and 
" Midnight Bay," and " Six-thirty Eiver." "What a pity 
this picturesque system suggested by Thursday and her sis- 
ter islands was not thought of before we had disfigured our 
maps with so many Smithtowns and Brownsvilles and Jones- 
ports, and Clark counties ! 

Soon the Chingtu is not only anchored, but made doubly 
secure by being tied up to an old hulk which is anchored in 
the roadstead for a sort of cargo-receiving ship ; and by the 
kind thoughtfulness of friends in Sydney, who had "wired" 
that we were coming, we are taken ashore by the agent of 
the chief mercantile house of the place, and are shown 
everything that the resources of Thursday Island have to 
offer. 

What are the great staple exports of Thursday Island, 
my readers? If I should give you twenty or a hundred 
and twenty guesses, you would not solve the conundrum. 
Not gold or silver, or tin or copper, or wool or mutton, or 
wheat or corn, or machinery or cotton goods, or sugar or 
spice, or rice or Yankee notions, but — do you give it up \ 
Beche de mer and mother-of-pearl ; or, in other words, sea 
worms and oyster shells. 

The Beche de mer is a long, slimy, nasty (in the Ameri- 
can, not the English, sense of the word) slug, w T hich looks 
for all the world like an exaggerated leech — the loathsome 
bloodsucker that used to fasten itself on my legs when I was 
a small boy and " went in swimming," as small boys love to 
do. But the Chinese consider this hideous slug a great deli- 



THE PEARL FISHERIES AND DIVERS. 133 

cacy, and a very large commerce in it has sprung up, for 
nowhere does it grow so fat and luscious as on the Aus- 
tralian coast and the adjacent islands. 

There are various kinds of Beche de mer, which experts 
distinguish as white, red, black, etc. ; and it brings from 
$150.00 to $?50.00 a ton. Just now, I believe, the red 
species of hideousness is most affected by Chinese gour- 
mands. I saw tons of these slugs dried and baled, and 
waiting for transportation to the Flowery Kingdom. 
" Dried fish " is the euphonious but commonplace name by 
which this article of export is known in Thursday Island. 

But the pearl fishery is, after all, the largest industry, 
important as is the Beche de mer trade. Three hundred 
small boats are engaged in the pearl fisheries, and very 
profitable they often prove to their owners, for not only is 
there a steady demand for the mother-of-pearl shell, but 
single perfect pearls are sometimes found worth from $1,000 
to $3,000-; so that always there is the excitement of possible 
sudden wealth connected with this pursuit. 

But the mother-of-pearl is the staple of trade, the pearls 
themselves being only the plums that are found in the pud- 
ding at rare intervals. Of these shells there seems to be 
an inexhaustible supply, and though the three hundred ves- 
sels engaged in the trade bring almost countless tons to the 
surface, there are still countless tons to be won from the 
ocean's depths. 

Our own vessel adds to her cargo more than seventy 
tons of shells, which will eventually reach Birmingham and 
Sheffield, to be made up into knife-handles and card-cases, 
inlaid cabinets, and other articles of vertu. 

The pearl diver's equipment is a most ungainly and curi- 
ous affair, for the shells are found in water many fathoms 
deep, and the heaviest of woolen clothes are used to protect 



134 ACROSS THE GULF TO PORT DARWIN. 

the diver from the pressure of the water, while the shoes 
with leaden soles which he uses to sink him to the bottom 
weigh fully ten pounds each, and the helmet which he dons 
weighs as much as both his shoes put together. 

But, even with the best of diving gear and the most ap- 
proved appliances, the diver's life is short and risky. He 
seldom is able to follow this pursuit more than five or six 
years, and no divers reach old age. 

Thursday Island is a place of great expectations rather 
than of vast performances. Though at present there is 
only a single row of straggling shops, with a few pleasant 
bungalows behind them, and a pathetic little " School of 
Arts," which contains two pictures, a few dilapidated curios, 
and a small library, it expects to be a great metropolis one 
of these days ; and, in fact, has an excellent location as 
calling port for steamers going to various parts of the world. 

Our cargo of mother-of-pearl is soon safely stowed away 
in the hold, the Chingtu weighs anchor again, and we are 
on our course once more, across the great Gulf of Carpen- 
taria and the southern portion of the Arafura Sea, about 
eight hundred miles, as the crow flies, to Port Darwin, the 
northern capital of North Australia. 

If Thursday Island has its greatness in the future, Port 
Darwin has had its day in the past. Great dreams were in- 
dulged in by its inhabitants in early days. A railroad was- 
to connect it with Adelaide across the whole length of the 
continent of Australia. All European steamers would make 
it their port, instead of going around the storm} 7 " southern 
coast. Passengers and mails would be transhipped hence to 
all parts of the world. Its early-discovered gold mine 
would make everybody rich, and Palmerston, situated at the 
head of the Port, would be one of the great commercial 
capitals of the world. 



A DISCOURAGED RAILROAD. 



135 



But this dream has not materialized. The railroad 
across the continent has not been built nor is it likely to be 
built. The only railroad of which Port Darwin boasts is a 
discouraged sort of an affair, that runs a hundred miles into 
the interior and then stops, not because it has reached an 




A YOUNG CITIZEN OF PORT DARWIN. 

important terminus, but because it has not energy to go any 
further. It cost a frightful amount of money, on which the 
South Australian people still have to pay interest, for it is 
a government affair, as all Australian railroads are. The 
two trains a day have dwindled down to two a week, and it 
bids fair soon to rival the famous " tri-weekly " road, whose 
president explained the title by saying that he sent a train 
clown the line one week and tried to get it back the next. 

The gold mines could not be worked at a profit by 
Europeans, and have all fallen into the hands of Chinamen, 



136 



BAKED AND BOILED. 



and the five or six thousand Englishmen and Australians 
who used to walk the fine, broad streets of Palmerston, and 
live in its pleasant houses, have dwindled to a few hundreds, 
who grumble at the government and shake their heads 




A NORTH QUEENSLAND ABORIGINAL. 

dismally, saying that Port Darwin's golden opportunity has 
gone by, never to return. 

If it is always as hot in Port Darwin as on baking- 
day and the steamy night that the Chingtu lay at her 
wharf, while we were her passengers, I do not wonder that 
Europeans who object to being both baked and boiled m the 
same twenty -four hours refuse to make it their home. 

The climate, however, seems exactly to suit the Aborigi- 
nal Australians who are found here in large numbers. Tall 



SAILING OVER TROPIC SEAS. 137 

men with long, thin legs, intensely black skins, and wiry 
crinkly hair, tall women equally black and equally thin, and 
absolutely naked little boys, perched on their mother's necks 
or trotting by their mother's side, as happy as boys of a 
cloudier clime, are seen everywhere. 

A few hours of intensely hot daylight and a long, in- 
sufferably hot night were quite enough of Port Darwin for 
us, and glad we were to hear the Captain's order the next 
morning to " cast off the bow line " and get under way. 

For the next twenty-three hundred miles the cruise of 
the Chingtu is between tropic islands and across tropic seas ; 
the Arafura and the Banda and the Celebes and the Sulu 
and the China seas, one after the other following each other 
in quick succession. 

A most lovely sail it is, and one that would be taken far 
oftener than it is by pleasure seekers if its joys were known. 
Scarcely a day of rough weather need be apprehended until 
the China sea is reached, and a most wonderful series of 
archipelagos is passed, any one of which might well delay 
a naturalist or ethnologist for years had he the time to 
spare. 

Our course at first lies among the Austro-Malayan group 
whose forests contain many of the typical Eucalyptus trees, 
and whose birds and insects are nearly allied to those of the 
great Australian continent which once doubtless extended 
much further north than it does at present. 

After we get into the Celebes sea we have touched the 
borders of the Indo-Malayan region where the islands are 
less affected by the blasting hot winds that cross the seas 
after sweeping over the Australian deserts, and where the 
birds and beasts, the trees and flowers, are more allied to 
those of India. 

Some of these islands are of vast extent. If you should 



138 DUTCH MONOPOLY OF NUTMEGS. 

draw a map of Borneo, for instance, you would find that 
it was not unlike in shape the United Kingdom of Great 
Britain and Ireland, but vastly larger, for you could set 
England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales inside of Borneo, and 
have a great rim of green trees and verdure hundreds of 
miles wide surrounding that mighty little kingdom. 

New Guinea is probably still larger than Borneo, though 
its irregular coasts and unexplored territory make it difficult 
to tell to a certainty. 

Many of these islands are under Dutch control, and very 
good masters on the whole do Dutchmen make. It would 
be difficult to know what the doughty little kingdom behind 
the dikes would do were it not for these spice islands of the 
South seas, where it coins gold out of nutmegs and cloves, 
cinnamon and allspice. 

The island of Banda is the greatest nutmeg region of the 
world, barring Connecticut, and many years ago the Dutch 
attempted to secure a monoply of this product by cutting 
down the nutmeg trees on the other islands where they 
grew naturally, in order that they might be confined to 
Banda, where the monopoly could be protected. 

Nutmeg trees are very symmetrical in shape, with bright 
glossy leaves. They grow to a height of twenty or thirty 
feet, bearing small yellow flowers. The fruit looks much 
like a peach in size and color. When it is ripe it splits open 
and shows a dark brown nut within. Still, we have not got 
to the nutmeg itself. The fruit is like a nest of Chinese 
boxes, for within the thin hard shell which is now disclosed 
is the nutmeg of commerce. 

Towards evening of the third day from Port Darwin we 
passed between the great islands of Ceram on one side and 
Bouro on the other. Nestling in the lee of Ceram is the 
little island of Amboyna, which contains one of the oldest 



THE MALAYAN AND THE PAPUAN. 139 

European settlements in the South seas. Here the Dutch 
governor is Lord of all he surveys, and is only disturbed 
in his solitude b}^ a few vessels that come on their spice- 
laden errands once or twice a year. 

The inhabitants of these islands may, in a general way, 
be divided into two great types, the Malayan and the 
Papuan. A rough classification gives the eastern islands to 
the Papuan races ; the western, which lie nearer to China 
and India, to the Malayan races. The Malay has been 
described as of "short stature, brown-skinned, straight- 
haired, beardless, and smooth-bodied. The Papuan is taller, 
is black-skinned, frizzly-haired, branded, and hairy-bodied. 
The former is broad-faced, has a small nose, and flat eye- 
brows ; the latter is long-faced, has a large and prominent 
nose and flat eye-brows. The Malay is bashful, cold, un- 
demonstrative, and quiet; the Papuan is bold, impetuous, 
excitable, and noisy. The former is grave and seldom 
laughs; the latter is joyous and laughter-loving — the one 
conceals his emotions, the other displays them. ,, 

Perhaps this epigrammatic description by one who spent 
many years among these islands will serve to introduce our 
neighbors on either side of the Chmgtu to my readers, 
better than any words of mine. 

There is little need to describe the clothes of either of 
these neighbors, for they seldom consult Paris modes or New 
York tailors. A friend of mine who once lived in New 
Guinea was consulted by a tailor of London as to whether 
there would not be a good opening for a man of his craft in 
that great island. My friend replied that a ball of twine 
would afford ample clothing for half a century for all the 
natives on the island, and he could scarcely encourage the 
knight of the goose and the shears to remove from the 
capitol of cockneydom. 



140 EXTRAORDINARY HEADGEAR. 

The story is told of a bridegroom who was presented on 
his wedding-day with a pair of European trousers. In the 
exuberance of his early love, he presented them to his bride, 
who appeared at the wedding ceremony, heated and per- 
spiring, with the trousers drawn on as far as possible over 
her head, while the legs hung down like tw T o huge, hollow 
tails, on either side. 

For my part I do not see the necessary connection of 
European clothes and European civilization. The nations 
can be civilized and christianized just as quickly, I believe, 
while allowed to wear their native costume, a loose piece 
of cloth tucked about the waist, as when arrayed in " boiled 
shirts " and swallow-tailed coats. 

The only grotesque and ridiculous natives I have seen, 
are those who ape European costumes and try to combine in 
a most laughable way New York and South Sea Island 
fashions. 

The islands between which we are continually passing, 
and whose sides we almost graze at times, abound in bright 
plumaged birds, parrots and paroquets, lyre birds and birds 
of paradise of every imaginable lovely hue. 

Beasts of prey are not very common, though tigers and 
orang-outangs are found in some of the large islands, and 
huge crocodiles abound in many of them. Snakes, however, 
are numerous and venomous, and a sharp lookout must be 
kept by the traveler, lest that innocent-looking fallen limb, 
on which he is about to put his foot, proves to be a huge 
python or boa constrictor. 

A famous naturalist tells a gruesome story about a great 
snake which he found in the thatched roof directly over his 
head one morning as he awoke. He had heard a rustling- 
noise the night before but paid little attention to it. The 
next morning, however, the cause of the noise was revealed, 



A SNAKE STORY. 141 

for, " looking more carefully," he says, " I could see yellow 
and black marks and thought it must be a tortoise shell put 
up there out of the way between the ridge-pole and the rooL 
Continuing to gaze, it suddenly resolved itself into a large 
snake, compactly coiled up in a knot; and I could detect his 
head and his bright eyes in the very center of the folds. 

" A python had climbed up one of the posts of the house ; 
had made his way under the thatch within a yard of my 
head, and taken up a comfortable position in the roof, and I 
had slept soundly all night, directly under him. 

"I called to my two native 'boys' who were skinning 
birds below, and said, 'Here's a big snake in the roof; but 
as soon as I had shown it to them they rushed out of the 
house and begged me to come out at once. 

"Finding they were too much alarmed to do anything*, 
we called some of the laborers in the plantation, and soon 
had half-a-dozen men in consultation. One of these said he 
would get him out, and went to work in a business-like way. 

" He made a strong noose of rattan, and with a long pole 
poked at the snake, which then began slowly to uncoil itself. 
He then managed to get the noose over its head, and slip- 
ping it well over its body began to drag the animal down. 

" There was a great scuffle as the snake coiled round the 
chains and posts to resist his enemy, but at length the man 
caught hold of his tail, rushed out of the house so quickly 
that the creature seemed quite confounded, and tried to 
strike its head against a tree. He missed it, however, and 
let go, and the snake got under a dead trunk near by. It 
was again poked out, and again the man caught hold of its 
tail, and running away quickly dashed its head with a swing 
against a tree, and it was then easily killed with a hatchet. 

"It was about twelve feet long and very thick, quite 
capable of swallowing a dog or child." 



142 "where every prospect pleases."' 

But this python was only a baby compared with another 
which this same veracious naturalist saw a little later, which 
was not less than twenty feet long, and fully able to tackle 
an ox or a horse if it got the chance. 

It would scarcely be proper to sail through this serpent- 
infested region without telling at least one snake story, but 
the above, vouched for by the highest authority, will per- 
haps suffice. 

After a twenty-four hours' run across a comparativelv 
open piece of water we passed between the Spanish convict 
island of Mandanao on one side, and Basilan on the other. 
On the other side of this passage we found the open waters 
of the Sulu sea awaiting us, and then, coasting up the long- 
shore of the Philippine islands; we have come at length out 
into the rough waters of the China sea, and are striking 
across this much-dreaded passage to the port of Hong Kong. 

All these islands which we pass are famous for their 
spic}^ tropical products. 

"The spicy breezes" blow soft not only over Ceylon's 
isle, but across Ceram and Bouro, Banda and Amboyna, 
Mandanao and Basilan. 

Every prospect pleases and even man is by no means as 
vile as he was a hundred years ago, for the missionary is 
abroad in most of these islands, the natives have responded 
most readily to his kindly touch, and, in many cases, whole 
islands are Christianized and are occupied by respectable, 
God-fearing, church-going races. Even the degradation 
which usually follows in the wake of commerce has not been 
entirely able to drag down these simple natives to the level 
of their white conquerors, and the most godless trader who 
knows what he is talking about can sometimes be found who 
will acknowledge that the missionary has transformed many 
a barbarous tribe of cannibals into an intelligent people, 



WHAT CHRISTIANITY HAS DONE. 143 

living in orderly villages; in pleasant, whitewashed houses, 
with flowering vines growing over the cool verandas. 
Moreover, in some places good roads and careful cultivation 
of the soil are found, all due to races that have emerged 
from the lowest barbarism within the memory of living 
men. 

I would like to take some of the shallow worldlings 
whom I have seen elevate their tip-tilted noses at missions, 
and whom I have heard sneer at every effort to make the 
heathen better, I would like to take them, I say, to some 
of the beautiful, orderly villages of Celebes, and stop their 
profane lips with a sight of what Christianity actually has 
done and is doing for these savages. I am doubtful if even 
this vision would do much good. Such men and women are 
too densely wrapped up in their impenetrable conceit to be 
disturbed by facts or figures, or convinced even by that 
which their own eyes might observe. They would not be- 
lieve "though one rose from the dead." 

Most of these islands, though nominally under the pro- 
tection and control of different European powers, to which 
they are obliged to pay some small tribute, are still practi- 
cally under the power of these native chiefs and princes, some 
of whose dynasties run back for many generations. 

A good story is told by the naturalist Wallace of the 
way in which one of these native chiefs took the census of 
his unsuspecting subjects. 

It seems that this chief or Rajah relied for his revenues 
upon the rice tax which each one of his people in all the 
villages of his domain was supposed to pay into his treasury 
every year. But he soon became convinced that his under 
officers were not treating him fairly, and that a good deal of 
the rice which ought to have found its way into the treasury 
of the Rajah was stopped on the way, either by the Kapala 



144 COMMUNING WITH THE SPIRIT OF THE VOLCANO. 

Kampong, the head man of the village, or by the Waidono 
who is over the district, or by the Gustis or head chief, who 
received the rice from the Waidono. 

But the Rajah could not prove the peculations, because 
he did not know how many people there were in his domain, 
and he could not tell how many people there were unless he 
took a census, and he could not take a census without putting 
all the under officers on their guard, for they would be sure to 
make the number of people in their districts correspond with 
the amount of rice which they turned over to His Majesty. 
So his problem was to take a census without having the 
people who were enumerated know anything about it. 

The poor Rajah was at his wit's end. He smoked and 
chewed betel nut all day long, and still was no nearer to 
the desired solution. At length, however, a bright idea 
struck him. He would go up into the great mountain of 
Lombock that belched out lire and vapor, and consult the 
deity of the mountain, for it was in the old days of heathen 
superstition and heathen worship. The awe-struck people 
followed him part way up the volcano, and then they dared 
to go no further. But the Rajah pressed on up into the 
region of perpetual smoke, and here he stayed for a long 
while, communing with the Great Spirit of the mountain. 

When his people who were waiting about the base of the 
mountain began to be thoroughly uneasy about their chief, 
he appeared again among them, and told them in solemn 
tones that the Great Spirit had revealed to him that a time 
of terrible pestilence was coming, and that the only way to 
avert the pestilence was to make twelve sacred krisses or 
daggers, to be sent, in case of need, to the plague-stricken 
villages. Moreover, these krisses must be of a peculiar kind, 
made of a great number of needles, each needle represent- 
ing one man or woman or child in his domain. 



THE TELLTALE NEEDLES. 145 

There must be no mistake, either, in the number of 
needles, for, if there was, the krisses would not avail, and 
the plague could not be averted. 

So the Gusti and the Waidonos and the Kapala Kam- 
pongs went to work very busily to collect in their different 
villages a needle from every man, woman, and child in all 
of Lombock, and they were very careful not to make any 
mistake, for fear the kris would not work property. At 
length the needles were all collected, and were welded into 
bright, shining daggers before the Rajah's own eyes, and 
then carefully wrapped in silk and laid away for use against 
the time of pestilence. 

The pestilence did not come, however, but the time of 
the rice harvest did come ; and when only a small quantity 
of rice was presented by any Gustis, the Rajah mildly re- 
marked that " there were five thousand needles sent from 
your province, and it ought to yield far more rice than 
this." Then the Gustis said the same thing to his Waidonos, 
and the Waidonos repeated the remark to the Kapala Kani- 
pongs ; and the result was that the following year the Rajah 
had four times as much rice as ever before, and he was able 
to give all his wives beautiful earrings, and to buy many 
more black horses from the white-skinned Dutchmen than 
ever in the past — all by reason of the remarkable interview 
he had with the Great Spirit in the mountain that sent out 
fire and smoke. 

I have spoken already of the human passengers of the 
Chingtu — the Chinamen, and Malays, Jews, Christians, and 
Bushmen. Besides these, we have some dumb passengers 
who are quite as interesting in their way. Among them a 
flock of merino sheep that were unceremoniously tied to- 
gether by their four legs and bundled overboard into a 
lighter at Thursday Island ; a dog whose master, the cattle- 



146 OUR DUMB PASSENGERS. 

drover, was taking into the bush to herd sheep and fight 
the Blacks. 

But, poor fellow, he scarcely held up his head after com- 
ing aboard. A kick or bruise of some kind just before em- 
barkation had injured him internally. He bore his pain, 
which was evidently intense, without a whimper or a groan 
for seven days, and on the eighth day turned his patient, 
affectionate eyes upon his master with a look of trustful love 
for the last time — and died. 

" I can't bear to go aft any more where my poor dog 
lay," said the cattle-drover, and I didn't wonder. 

Besides the dog and sheep, we had, at the beginning, sev- 
eral specimens of the feline tribe. Two or three forlorn 
little kittens haunted the steerage belonging to the China- 
men. For two or three days they prowled disconsolately 
about, evidently aware of the fate that awaited them, and 
then they mysteriously disappeared, leaving no trace behind. 
The gastronomic Chinaman could, perhaps, have explained 
their disappearance, for all is soup that comes to his pot. 

But besides these wretched, woe-begone little kittens, we 
had on board a magnificent, stately, tortoise-shell cat, as 
handsome a pussy as ever trod a ship's quarter deck. He 
would watch the second-class passengers at their meals in a 
very dignified way, and would even accept a gratuity from 
their hands in the shape of a savory titbit, once in a while. 
He would jump through our extended arms, and do every 
trick that a well-educated pussy is supposed to know. One 
evening the northeast monsoon was blowing a stiff gale, and 
had spattered up the salt spray until every rail was wet and 
slippery. Tommy was unusually frisky. He jumped from 
spar to hatchway, ran up the rigging, and worked off his 
high spirits in every way known to a cat. But, alas ! he 
jumped once too often, for leaping from the hatch to the 



A TRAGEDY ON ELECTION DAY. 147 

guard rail, he lost his balance, clawed for a moment help- 
lessly at the wet, slippery wood, and fell off into the engulf- 
ing sea. 

It is hoped that some passing shark cut short his misery, 
and that he was not obliged to struggle for hours with the 
waves, drowning by inches. 

That day was Election day in the United States. The 
mighty quadrennial struggle between the two great parties 
was being decided as the hours went by. To the English- 
men, Australians, and Chinese, who made up our passenger 
list, this struggle was absolutely uninteresting. Though it 
affects the lives of nearly seventy millions of people, it did 
not create as much excitement as the death of a tortoise-shell 
cat. Such is the relative importance of an event. So de- 
pendent is it on geography and ethnography. 

Our captain had a vague idea that one or the other of 
the leading candidates had before been nominated for elec- 
tion. When I explained that one of the candidates was then 
president, and the other had held that office, he was quite 
amazed, but remarked : " Oh, well, hit wont make much 
hodds, I suppose, they're both proper rascals." 

I resented the imputation against these excellent and 
honorable men with the utmost warmth, and yet it is of 
little use to wax hot, for the ingrained and unremovable 
British opinion of American politics is, that all our politicians 
are rogues and knaves. I scarcely wonder at this, for the 
British press does its utmost to foster this impression, and 
our own sensational journals, with their scurrilous attacks 
on public men, only strengthens the same impression. 

Three days more with this gentle monsoon blowing 
across the wide China Sea will bring us to Hong Kong, and 
then the cruise of the Chingtu will be ended. 



CHAPTER YIII. 

FIRST GLIMPSES OF THE CELESTIAL EMPIRE. 

Cosmopolitan Hong Kong — The Cabmen of the Orient — A Ride in a 
Sedan Chair — Uplifted in Spirit — Sidewalk Shops — Pennsylvania Oil 
in China — Fairyland under the Lanterns — Incense Offerings to the 
Gods — Novel Sights and Scenes — Oriental Sharpers — Unblushing 
Swindlers — Toboggan Sliding — All Aboard for Canton — Justice 
Swift and Severe — Executions in China — Heads Chopped off with 
Neatness and Despatch — The River God at the Prow — The Fatshan — 
River Robbers and Pirates — A Floating Arsenal — The Rice Harvest — 
Threshing Out the Rice — " Chinaman Makee Glow" — Three Crops in 
a Season — Water Buffaloes — Christianity and Butter — Up the Pearl 
River — Junks and Flower Boats, Sampans and Slipper Boats — The 
High Road of Canton — A Novel Pontoon Bridge — A Family Picture 
— Cantonese Jade — Off in a Sampan. 




UST as the sun was setting after 
a gray and turbulent day, the 
Chingtu reached the outer har- 
bor of Hong Kong. The waning 
light held out barely long enough 
to discover our anchorage ground. 
What a sight was the first glimpse 
of life in Asia! On the Hong 
Kong shore were thousands of 
twinkling lights, reaching far up 
the hillside. The magnificent 
warehouses and residences of the 
foreign merchants give it the appearance of a modern city, as 
indeed it is, but, together with this modern and cosmopolitan 
air is mingled the antiquity of the far East. On every side 

were Chinese junks, whose style is the same as in the days of 

(148) * 



ASIATIC SIGHTS AND SOUNDS. 149 

the Mayflower, of the Pinta, and the Nina ; the same 
in fact as when the Roman galleys vexed the waters of 
the Mediterranean. 

Little boats, too, sampans and still smaller row-boats, 
swarmed about the Chingtu. As it was now growing 
dark they were all illumined with Chinese lanterns of every 
variety of style and shape, and yells and cries, and invita- 
tions from the occupants to take their boat to the shore, 
reminded us of the vociferous cabbies at the Grand Central 
Station in New York. But there was little else to remind 
us of New York. We had indeed reached the Orient. 

Taking a steam-launch sent out by the Hong Kong 
Hotel we were soon on shore. Then all the sights and 
sounds, to say nothing of the smells, reminded us that we 
were on Asiatic soil. A crowd of iinrikisha and sedan chair 
men besieged us on every side. A throng of half-naked 
coolies jabbered and crowded and, fought with each other 
and insisted on being our porters. But, though it required 
some rough usage on the part of the hotel porters, we at last 
escaped their clutches and reached the hotel, which is but 
a few steps from the landing. A European hotel, however, 
was altogether too commonplace an affair to engage our 
attention for any length of time, and after we had taken 
a hasty dinner we were soon upon the street again. 

Will you not go out with us while we view these unac- 
customed sights ? 

Now again as we step out of the hotel door, there is a 
great hubbub and hullaballoo, for scores of chair-men and 
jinrikisha-men rush upon us as their right and lawful prey. 
Let us take a chair this evening since it is more in accord- 
ance with the genius of the country. The jinrikisha , is a 
Japanese institution and a very recent importation into 
China, and we will patronize home industries. 



150 THE BURDEN BEARERS. 

So, with, many polite gestures and genuflections on the 
part of our bearers, we crawl into one of the little boxesi 
take our seats, and are immediately hoisted upon the 
shoulders of three stalwart coolies, two in front and one be- 
hind. The skin on their accustomed necks is hardened and 
calloused by many such loads which they have borne, and at 
first a feeling of great compassion and pity for them arises 
in our hearts, as though we were treating human beings as 
we would treat a horse or an ox. We almost feel as though 
we ought to step down from our exalted position and apolo- 
gize to the bearers for loading them down as we would 
k ' dumb, driven cattle." But, after all, the sensible traveler 
reasons with himself, this is an honorable and reputable way 
of earning a living. No opprobrium or disgrace attaches to 
the palanquin-man. He would bear the people of his own 
race and station in society as quickly as he would bear the 
Emperor, and would have no sense of degradation. It 
affords a great multitude, who perhaps would otherwise 
starve, an excellent living. So we will dismiss our scruples 
and enjoy the novel sights around us. 

Then, perhaps, so sharp are the revulsions of feeling in 
weak human nature, one begins to have a wealthy and 
lordly feeling, as though he were being borne through the 
streets on the shoulders of an admiring crowd because of 
some great achievement. However, the throngs are not 
very demonstrative in their admiration, for they take no 
more notice of you than a ISTew York crowd would take of a 
Broadway street-car. In fact, we who are perched up in 
these chairs are far more interested in the crowds beneath 
than they are in us, for foreigners are no novelty in Hong 
Kong. 

Let us go down to the Chinese quarter and get out of 
this humdrum European life as soon as possible. It does 



OUT-OF-DOOR AVOCATIONS. 



151 



not take us long to do this, for there are only eight thou- 
sand foreigners in the city and some two hundred thousand 
natives. Everything is of interest to our unaccustomed eyes. 
But we must record our impressions quickly before custom 
dulls the edge of amazement, or it will seem as though Ave 




A CHINESE FORGE. 

had always lived in the midst of these sights, and shall not 
be able to describe them with any vividness to our friends at 
home. 

The first thing that strikes us as strange is, that every- 
thing is done out-of-doors. The shoemaker cobbles his 
shoes ; the fish merchant peddles his fish ; the cabinet-maker 
fits together his chest of drawers ; the tailor shoves his 
needle ; the carpenter draws his plane (toward himself in 
genuine Chinese style), but all upon the sidewalk as it 

seems. There are, to be sure, small recesses which are 
10 



152 LANTERNS AND INCENSE. 

called stores and shops, but they are very diminutive and 
scarcely seem necessary to the carrying on of business. 

Over every shop door hangs a paper lantern, some of 
them huge affairs as big as small balloons, others more mod- 
est in size, while here and there one sees a vulgar kerosene 
lamp. It is said that the oil wells of Pennsylvania are driv- 
ing the old-fashioned lanterns out of the market. All who 
desire picturesqueness of effect will certainly regret this, for 
there is nothing which gives the streets such a charming, 
fairy-like effect as the Chinese lanterns, painted in every hue 
of the rainbow, and twisted into every conceivable shape. 

Not only has every shop its lantern, but every shop has 
its shrine as well, and the smell of burning incense pervades 
the air wherever we go. This is rather fortunate, perhaps, 
for it obscures certain other odors which are not so pleasant. 

If you look closely, even in the darkness of this first even- 
ing's ride, you will see a stick of incense burning beside 
•every doorway, the little spot of fire at the end glowing like 
a, tiny jewel in the night. These are all offered to the gods 
of prosperity and good luck in the hope that the business 
ventures carried on within will turn out successfully. 

But after all, novel as are the sights about Hong Kong, 
it is one of the least interesting cities, in many respects, in 
all China. It is too much Europeanized to afford a true idea 
of the way in which the natives live and conduct their busi- 
ness. It has all the vices of a city in the far East, and not 
all its virtues by any means. Everything is frightfull} r dear 
at the European stores, and in this free-trade possession of 
Great Britain, the shop-keepers will unblushingly charge you 
four or five times as much as an article is worth anywhere 
else. The hotel-keepers will fleece you out of your last 
dollar if they can. Photographers will charge you as much 
for a single picture as would buy a dozen better ones in 



ASCENT OF VICTORIA PEAK. 153 

Japan ; and your morning paper, which will cost you ten 
cents, will not contain a farthing's worth of news. Nothing 
more barren and meager and utterly uninteresting than the 
Hong Kong newspaper has it been my lot to find in any 
part of the civilized or uncivilized world. Society is decid- 
edly " fast," as in all such foreign settlements, and were it not 
for the saving salt of missionary life and influence, I am told 
by those who know, Hong Kong, and Yokohama in Japan, 
and other such treaty ports, might easily out-rank Sodom 
and Gomorrah and the Cities of the Plain. 

There is one place, however, which we must visit before 
leaving Hong Kong for the far more interesting city of 
Canton, and that is Yictoria Peak, which towers up for a 
thousand feet or more directly behind the city. This is a 
beautiful, conical mountain, exceedingly steep and precipi- 
tous, but the way up has been made easy by a cog-wheel 
railroad, which affords, certainly, the most abrupt climb 
with which I am acquainted. Far steeper than the Bigi or 
the Mt. Washington railroad or Pike's Peak is the railroad 
that climbs Yictoria Peak. Nervous women sometimes 
grow quite hysterical as the train begins to move up an 
incline steeper than the roof of a house. But the railway is 
managed with great skill and with every precaution to insure 
safety, and there has never been here any loss of life, so far 
as I know. 

As one climbs this famous mountain, a magnificent pano- 
rama unfolds before him, of city and sea, of embracing 
mountains and yet higher distant peaks. Every view is a 
little more entrancing than the last, until one stands at the 
very summit. Then, on every hand, is a landscape which 
one can expect to see but seldom in a lifetime. Such a vast 
and stupendous combination of ocean and mountain is almost 
worth a stormy journey across the Pacific to behold. 



154 BY BOAT TO CANTON. 

"We have reached the spot near the top where the rail- 
road stops, and where our foot-journey begins, unless we 
choose to take a sedan-chair, which, for thirty cents, will 
carry us to the topmost point. We refused, however, to be 
borne up this magnificent mountain in airy such ignominious 
way. The chair is all very well for level ground, or for get- 
ting through the crowded streets ; but the true mountain 
climber would feel ashamed of himself to be borne aloft on 
men's shoulders up these rugged paths as long as he has two 
good legs to carry him. The road, though very steep, is 
well made, and affords so many exquisite views from every 
angle aftd turn of the twenty minutes' climb to the peak 
that it is a continual delight. 

But the wind is blowing shrewdly from the top, and we 
do not linger long, even though the view is entrancing ; but 
soon descend, take the train once more, and in eight min- 
utes slip down this tremendous toboggan-slide on to level 
ground again. 

To-morrow morning we will take the river-boat for Can- 
ton, a journey of about one hundred miles, and one which 
affords us vast delight. The steamers on the Pearl River 
are excellent side-wheel boats, not unlike the best river-boats 
in America, officered by Europeans, though manned by 
Chinese crews. There are some things about them, how- 
ever, which would remind us that we are still in China. At 
the prow is a large image which I took for a figure-head, but 
was soon informed that it was the river-god, who must be 
propitiated even by this modern steamship company ; so 
they had placed his obese figure in a little shrine at the 
very prow of the Fatshan. 

Looking within the cabin, too, we see a stack of rifles, 
and are assured by the Captain that they are necessary in 
case the boat should be attacked by the river pirates — a not 



FLOATING ARSENALS. 



155 



inconceivable impossibility. A few months ago one of these 
steamers was captured by a swarm of these robbers, who 
had come aboard as second-class passengers. The officers 
were overpowered, and the passengers were shut up in a 
tight and close cabin, where they barely had air enough to 





A CHINESE EXECUTION. 
(From an instantaneous photograph.) 

keep them alive, while their pocketbooks were rifled and the 
steamer plundered by these systematic knaves of every pos- 
sible thing of value. Then they took themselves off, mak- 
ing sure that they should not be pursued until they had 
gotten well out of the way. Chinese passengers are not 
now allowed in the first cabin, and every steamer goes well 
armed with a small arsenal of modern weapons. 



156 



CHINESE EXECUTION. 



Swift justice is dealt out to Chinese criminals, and only 
a short time elapses after sentence before the head of the 
condemned person is severed from the body by a single 
stroke of the executioner's keen sword. 

Prisoners under sentence of death wear bamboo yokes 
when they are taken to the place of execution. The head 




PLACING THE HEAD OF AN EXECUTED CRIMINAL IN A BASKET. 

(From an instantaneous photograph.) 

of the prisoner is placed between two rigid bamboo bars, 
one in front and the other at the back of the neck, while 
two shorter bars rest across the shoulders and fasten the 
long side bars together. The headsman accompanies the 
procession to the field of execution, holding his blade aloft, 
followed by a crowd of spectators. The execution is public, 
and generally takes place in an open field accessible to all. 



UP THE PEARL RIVER. 



159 



The prisoner kneels, bends forward a trifle, bows his head, 
and in an instant all is over. 

The sail up the river is a most interesting one, following 
the windings of the great stream, which sometimes broadens 
out into a lake miles upon miles in extent, and sometimes 




COOLIES PUMPING WATER FOR RICE FIELDS. 

narrows again with frowning peaks close overhead. Every- 
where are the swarming villages — thirty thousand, I am 
told, in a single province — each one occupied by from one 
to ten thousand people. 

The rice crop was just being cut as we sailed up this 
noble river, and down to the very verge hung the ripened 
grain on heavy stalks. This was the second crop of the 



160 PRIMITIVE METHOD OF HARVESTING. 

year, and laborers, men and women, were busy everywhere 
harvesting it — just as for three thousand years past, per- 
haps, their ancestors had harvested a similar crop. After 
cutting the rice-straw near the ground with a small sickle 
and piling it in heaps, they grasp a good-sized handful of 
the grain and thresh out the rice by the simple process of 
beating the heads over the edge of a stone or a piece of 
board armed with iron teeth. A little screen keeps the rice 
from flying far in any direction, and on both sides we 
could see hundreds of these little screens and these primitive 
harvesters gathering the great staple crop of China, 

"Wonderful gardeners are these Cantonese in any part of 
the world. Whether in America or Australia, the Sandwich 
Islands or on their own native heath, they can coax the 
ground to yield to them what she would never give up 
to the more civilized races, who, perhaps, look down on 
them as ignorant barbarians. Even in tropical Australia, in 
the dryest of the dry seasons, they can make things grow if 
only Avater can be had with which to drench the soil. " Me 
no likee lain," said a Chinaman to me ; " lainey time anyone 
laise things ; dly time only Chinaman makee glow." 

But here along the banks of the great river they find 
not only plenty of water, but a most fertile soil, and any 
Chinaman who does not get at least three crops off of every 
inch of land which he possesses is thoroughly ashamed of 
himself. Two crops of rice and one of vegetables is the 
regulation thing, while some farmers force even four crops 
every year from the same piece of ground. 

Another interesting feature of the landscape is the huge 
water-buffaloes which love to wallow along the banks of the 
river. They look more like the rhinoceros than like the 
buffalo of our plains, with thick welts of hairy skin hanging 
on their sides and legs. However, they are a very useful 



AT THE WHARF IN CANTON. 161 

animal, though rather hideous in appearance. They are 
employed in plowing and working the rice fields, and afford 
an excellent milk which is used by the foreign residents ot 
Canton and vicinity, where there are no cows. The Chinese 
themselves, however, after they are weaned, have no use for 
food of this sort, and look upon the rest of us, I suppose, as 
poor " milk-sops " for demanding it on our tables morning, 
noon, and night. 

Nor can they understand how we find it difficult to 
exist without butter and cheese. A recently converted 
Chinaman, explaining to his neighbors the joys of Christian- 
ity, said to them, " Now Christianity is not like butter, for 
you have to learn to like that before you can eat it. It is 
horrid tasting stuff when you first try it, and you can only 
endure it after a good many efforts. But Christianity is- 
something that you do not have to learn to like. It is just 
as good the first time you taste it as it is the last." A good 
hint here for public speakers to adapt their illustrations to 
the people who listen to them. 

But all this time we are sailing up the great Pearl river, 
Avith its interminable rice fields and its clustering villages 
nestling behind them at the base of the mountains. 

At last the Fatshan reaches her wharf in Canton, and 
we find ourselves at once in one of the strangest and most 
remarkable cities on the face of the earth. Around us are 
swarming junks and flower-boats, sampans and slipper-boats 
of all sizes, as thickly as their struggling owners can crowd 
about the Fatshan. 

They row and pole, and hook on to their neighbors and 
grab our steamer's chains in their mad and eager scramble 
to get some passengers or freight for other parts of the city ; 
for this great river is the high road for all Canton. Fully 
seventy-five thousand people live in these boats on the river 



102 HOME LIFE ON A SAMPAN. 

at Canton alone all the year round. The number is usually 
put much higher, but 1 am assured that this is a very mod- 
erate estimate. 

As the steamer is being tied up to her dock let us peer 
over into one of these little boats that is struggling to get 
near us. It is like a thousand others that are wedged 
so closely together that one could easily walk for miles over 
their little roofed decks without getting his feet wet. It 
seems like a continuous pontoon bridge, though none of the 
boats are tied together, and all are struggling to move in 
some direction and for some purpose. 

But look down into this particular sampan which we 
have chosen to interview. A brawny woman wields a long, 
heavy oar in front. She is evidently captain, first officer, 
and cook, as well as chief engineer of the little craft. On 
her back is strapped a baby whose little head bobs and 
sways with every motion that its mother makes in sculling 
the boat. The handle of the huge sweep which she uses just 
escapes the top of his bald little head. Her glossy black 
hair is done up with great skill and neatness into the shape 
of a "tea-pot handle," as a little boy by my side declares. 
Through this tea-pot handle is stuck a green jade pin, and in 
both ears are huge jade earrings. ]STo woman in Canton 
seems too poor to afford these precious jewels. Of all the 
thousands of women of high grade and low whom I have 
seen in Canton, I scarcely remember one without the na- 
tional jade ornaments. 

On the stern of this little craft are four children, one boy 
of eight years of age, who, manly little fellow that he is, 
assists his mother with an oar three times as long as him. 
self. Another boy of four is feeding with kernels of rice 
some chickens which are tied by the leg to one side of the 
boat. Still another little olive branch that can. just toddle, 



CLOSE QUARTERS. 163 

and is possibly two years old, is tied by a string to the roof 
of the deck, which allows him to go to the very edge of the 
boat, but insures his being pulled in if he should happen to 
fall overboard. In the stern of the boat also are all the 
culinary arrangements for the family ; all the pots and 
kettles and crockery ware and chop-sticks that are needed 
for a family of six. Behind the kitchen is the shrine, and as 
the door is open we can get a peep within at the gilded god, 
who is sitting complacently on his haunches, while two 
sticks of incense are burning before him. 

In the center of the boat, covered with a low roof, are 
seats on two sides for five or six passengers, for it is the bus- 
iness of this family, while the husband is at work on shore, 
to get all the passengers it can and to eke out their living in 
this way. I must fall back on a general reputation which I 
trust I have for sobriety and truthfulness when I tell you 
that this boat by actual measurement is only fourteen feet 
long and four feet wide in the widest part. Even this 
sampan is larger than many others which crowd about our 
steamer's side, but it looks so clean and roomy, the children 
look so good natured, and the mother smiles so pleasantly,, 
that we will take this boat and give the woman ten cents (a 
liberal sum) to take us to our friends some two miles up the- 
river. 



iKffE 







CHAPTER IX. 

IN CANTON THE CROWDED — CHINA AND THE CHINESE. 
— CURIOUS SCENES AMONG A CURIOUS PEOPLE — IN 
THE TEMPLE OF HORRORS. 

Ah Cum, Jr. — A Courteous and Faithful Guide — Aimless Wandering — 
The Birthday of the Fire God — Turning out for a Sedan chair — Close 
Quarters — A City of Temples — Streets with Odd Names — "Lon- 
gevity Lane " — " Heavenly Peace Street " — A Changing Panorama — 
Outrageous Odors — A Pestilential Place without Pestilence — A Puz- 
zle for our Doctors — People who Never Heard of a Plumber — The 
Live Fish Market — Candy Stands — How Much can you Buy for a 
Cash ? — Going to Market in Corea — A Royal Present — Juvenile 
Curiosity — That Little "Foreign Devil" — The Cat and Dog Meat 
Store — The Original of the Willow Pattern — The Five Hundred 
Buddhists — Worshiping the Gods of Good Luck and Prosperity — 
Business-like Methods of Worship — The Temple of Horrors — A 
Necklace of Teeth — Some of the Tortures — Sawing a Man in Two — 
Boiled in Oil — Punishments of the Buddhist Hell. 




E were exceeding fortunate, on our 
arrival at Canton, in finding the 
best guide it has ever been our 
good fortune to secure. Mr. Ah 
Cum, Jr., deserves to have his 
name embalmed in history. Just 
before our visit a famous Ameri- 
can traveler had visited the same 
city, and he wrote in the guide's 
book, a la Isaac Walton : " Doubt- 
less God conld make a better 
guide than Ah Cum, Jr., but 
doubtless he never did." We feel like endorsing this com- 
mendation to the fullest extent after spending a few hours 
in Ah Cum's society. He not only knew everything in 
Canton, but could speak intelligent English to explain to us 

(164) 



AN ENDLESS ARCADE. 165 

what we saw. He knew how to keep the land sharks who 
snap at every innocent traveler away from us, and though 
he doubtless piloted us to stores which paid him a good 
commission, he would not let us pay more than twice what 
a thing was worth, even to his friends. 

As we take this journey through Canton's crowded 
streets, the three pilgrims require sedan chairs, with another 
one for Ah Cum, Jr. ; but in the train of this short proces- 
sion we can take a hundred thousand of you just as well, 
without crowding anyone. At first we say to Ah Cum 
that we do not wish to go anywhere in particular ; " just 
take us through the streets ; let us see how the people live, 
how they buy and sell and get gain ; let us see how they 
pound their meal, and sell their fish, and make their shoes, 
and shave their heads, and paint their pictures, and do their 
ivory work, and fashion their jewelry, and turn out their 
pottery." It is not necessary to stop and go inside of any 
building to see all of these things, for, as in all Chinese 
cities, these handicrafts are carried on in shops out of which 
the front has been completely taken. There is a rear wall 
to these shops and two side walls, but no front wall in 
the daytime ; and passing through the streets of Canton 
seems like going through a never-ending arcade. The streets 
are so narrow and so covered overhead with awnings and 
immense signs that one can scarcely realize that he is in 
the open air. The dim light streams down from above, mel- 
lowing and tempering even the most hideous things, while 
the gay costumes and fabrics, and gold-lettered signs, give a 
holiday air to the whole city. 

Moreover, it is the birthday of the Fire God when we 
chance to go through the city, and the people are celebrat- 
ing his nativity with an unceasing fusilade of firecrackers. 
Whole bunches of the snappiest kind of crackers are thrown 



166 CIVIL ENGINEERING. 

recklessly into the streets under the very feet of our coolie 
bearers, which make them dance and caper, though they 
take it all very good-naturedly. Each of us on this journey 
has three bearers, two in front and one behind ; and the 
streets are so narrow that it is with the greatest difficulty 
that two chairs can pass each other. Indeed, when two 
chairs approach from opposite directions a catastrophe seems 
unavoidable, but somehow or other it is always avoided. 
The people flatten themselves against the walls on either 
side, taking up as few cubical inches as possible ; and at 
length, oftentimes with a good deal of turning and twisting 
and engineering, the chairs coming from opposite directions 
pass one another. 

Canton contains about one million people, so conservative 
writers say, though the number is placed by many at a far 
larger figure. As the more accurate census of later years 
is taken, the population of China is dwindling somewhat, 
and the enormous figures that were believed by our fore- 
fathers are scarcely borne out by the enumerators. Peking 
is not so enormously large as has been supposed, while 
Canton, which used to be said in many quarters to have 
two millions of inhabitants, is found to have only about 
one million. However, this is quite enough for the area 
that is inhabited. 

If ever people were packed together like sardines in a 
box, or peas in a pod, it is in this same city of Canton. 
No superfluous room, as I have said, is taken up by the 
streets, and this city which, if it was spread out like 
Washington or Melbourne, or even New York, would re- 
quire a wall something like one hundred miles in length, 
is encompassed by a wall less than six miles in circuit. 
This wall was built in the eleventh century, and was 
finished as it now stands more than five hundred years 



A CURIOUSLY CHANGING PANORAMA. 167 

ago. In it are sixteen gates, besides two water gates. 
Canton became a port of foreign commerce more than a 
thousand years ago, but it was not until 1637 that a fleet 
of English vessels entered the river. Since then the trade 
has largely been in the hands of the English, who seem, 
in whatever part of the world they go, to get their full 
share of the good things of this life. 

There are 125 temples in the city of Canton, and every 
little shop has its altar, before which the daily incense is 
burned. I am told that more is spent for incense and 
candles at these altars than is given for foreign missions for 
the whole world by the great Congregational and Presby- 
terian boards of the United States. 

Some of the streets through which we pass have odd 
names ; for instance, one of them is " Longevity Lane " ; 
another, " Heavenly Peace street," while " High street " and 
" Market street " sound very familiar. I wish in our own 
country we might have more streets of " Benevolence and 
Love." We will at least pass through this street in Canton, 
even though it belies its names. 

We shall never get accustomed to this constantly chang- 
ing panorama ; these odd people ; these queer costumes ; 
these strange sights ; these outrageous odors ! Cologne 
itself, with all its seventy smells, cannot for a moment 
compare w T ith Canton. 

It is a wonder that the people are not exterminated by 
typhoid fever and diphtheria. There is no drainage to 
speak of, and what little there is lies immediately below the 
flagstones over which we pass, and is very rarely, if ever, 
flushed by running water. Strange to say, however, we are 
told that the rate of mortality is not especially high in Can- 
ton ; that there are many old people in the city and that it is 
not often visited by any sweeping pestilence. What will 



168 IGNORANT OF DRAINS AND CUT-OFFS. 

our doctors and sanitary engineers and plumbers, who make- 
life miserable for the householder, say to this? 

If ever we have a little scarlet rash in the house among 
the children, or if the doctor can discover a white patch in 
our throats, he at once declares that the plumbing is out of 
order and the Health Department compels us to rip up the 
floors and discover the cause of the affliction in some hidden 
and undiscoverable lead pipe. The plumber is called in and 
he declares that his rival who plumbed the house was a per- 
fect idiot and knew nothing about sanitary engineering. 
That means a bill of several hundred dollars for the most im- 
proved style of pipes and traps and drains, and, as likely as 
not, the next year scarlet fever attacks another child and 
a white patch appears on the other side of our throats. Yet 
these benighted people of Canton, who never heard of a 
plumber, who know not how to build a decent drain, and 
are not initiated into the mysteries of patent traps, cut-offs, 
and counter vents, live on century after century in their ill- 
drained, foul-odored city, in blissful ignorance of what they 
escape by not being sufficiently civilized. 

Some of the shops which interest us most as we pass, 
along the streets are the fish markets. The fish are all 
brought to the market alive and Avriggling. When a cus- 
tomer comes along, he picks out the fish which he fancies in 
the tank ; the dealer dextrously captures him with a net> 
splits and beheads him in sight of the customer who goes on 
his way rejoicing, knowing that at least he will have fresh 
fish for dinner. 

The many little candy stands and booths for selling nuts 
and cakes also interest us. There is a kind of soft yellow 
cake made of beans which is greatly affected by the lower 
class of Chinese, and which always has a Chinese character 
stamped on the top ; there are peanut venders on whose 



CHEAP FOR "CASH. 



169 



trays are arranged little piles of peanuts which, are worth 
one "cash" (one-tenth of a cent) each, while other dealers 
confine their attention to betel nuts, of which they carry 
a stock in trade consisting of half a dozen nuts cut into 
quarters, with some pungent leaves to wrap them in before 



■Of* 




FISHING WITH CORMORANTS. 

they are masticated. In other places we find row after 
row of toy shops and little earthenware establishments, 
where the largest thing of value will cost about one cent. 

In fact, it would be interesting to see how many things 
on the streets of Canton could be bought for a cash. A 
collection of such articles would fill a cabinet with rare 
curiosities. But let not any foreigner think he could make 
such purchases. The thrifty Chinese dealer is sure that the 
said foreigner's pockets are lined with gold and will charge 
him at least ten times the true value of any article desired. 
He can only get what he wants at a reasonable price by 
sending a Chinaman for it and paying him a commission for 
buying in the cheapest market. 

In the large stores the "cash" is not very much used, 

but small silver pieces, pennies and huge, dirty, ragged bank 

bills ; but the street venders and cheap Jacks on the side- 
11 



170 A COW-LOAD OF COINS. 

walk trade, for the most part, in cash alone, and one needs 
to carry an extra sedan chair to hold his money if he 
expects to make many purchases with these cumbrous coins. 
The small coinage, however, is not so large here as it is 
in Corea, or at least the precious metals are more used. I 
am told that in Corea the purchaser who goes to market 
drives a coav before him to carry his cash, and if he expects 
to make any considerable purchases, he must load two cows 
with the necessary money. The cows carry his coins, but 
he can carry his purchases home in his hands. 

The royal family of Corea, it is said, desired to make a 
missionary a present on the occasion of his marriage, since 
the missionary had been serviceable to the emperor's wife 
when ill. What was the missionary's surprise to find six 
coolies come to his house each loaded down with a huge 
chest of money which was all they could stagger under. 
When he came to count his treasure, he found that his pres- 
ent was a generous donation of $300, all in copper cash. 

As we go along the streets in our sedan chairs, we excite 
a great deal of comment and amused attention from the 
passers by and from the store-keepers as well. The little 
Pilgrim, especially, attracts the notice of all the boys and 
girls in Canton. When they catch sight of him in his chair, 
they chuckle and giggle and point their fingers at him, and 
laugh as if he was the funniest object they ever beheld. A 
little imp with a long queue will scuttle into the house as we 
go by, and call his father and mother, his uncles and aunts, 
and his brothers' and sisters and cousins, to look at that 
strange cavalcade, and especially at that little "foreign 
devil," as he persists in calling the juvenile Pilgrim. 

One would suppose that foreigners were so numerous in 
the vicinity of Canton, they would excite no interest, but, as 
a matter of fact, comparatively few of them are seen on the 



AMUSING CURIOSITIES. 



171 



streets of the native city. Ladies are an especial curiosity, 
and American boys are evidently most amusing and long-to- 
be-remembered creatures. It is very probable that some of 
those slant-eyed little Celestials are still talking about that 
small boy in the Boston High School cap, and those absurd 
short trousers and long stockings, and that queer American 
reefer, who once passed through their streets. 




PRISONERS IN A CANTON JAIL. 



There are a few " show places " in Canton, as there are 
in every city, which the traveler must not neglect, though I 
must say that I always prefer first to get an idea of the way 
the common people live, rather than to be dragged from 
temple to pagoda, and from pagoda to university by the 
eager and loquacious guide. But that is one of Ah Cum's 
good points. He is willing that you should see what you 
want to see, and will not insist upon your seeing only what 
he considers wonderful. He lets us have our fill of Canton- 



172 GRANDMOTHER'S BLUE CHINA. 

ese sights and sounds and odors ; he is willing that we 
should gratify our curiosity by looking into very humble 
and insignificant shops. He is not ashamed of us if we stop 
to glance at the street peddler, and he does not frown upon 
us with righteous indignation even when we look into the 
cat and dog meat store. Here is one poor pussy, stiff and 
cold, and singed of all her hair, awaiting a customer. A 
poor puppy that has departed this life, looks ghastly since he 
has been dressed and trussed like a pig. In another part of 
the store, a wicker basket contains another specimen of the 
feline race, which, Ah Cum says, will be sacrificed at noon, 
at which time we shall see a great many more cats and dogs 
if we happen to pass that way. 

First in viewing Canton's famous sights, let us go into 
the Guild Hall of the tea merchants. It is a very old 
affair, and the carving and terra cotta work is exceedingly 
fine; but we are especially interested in a little garden 
behind the Guild Hall, for, from this garden the famous 
willow pattern was copied, which is found upon the blue 
china ware of our grandmothers and great-grandmothers. 
The original tree which gave it its name has died, but the 
other features are the same which have been perpetuated so 
many scores of millions of times, on the plates and cups and 
saucers and teapots and teacups, which, in the olden time, 
were treasured by the mothers and handed down to the 
daughters with such scrupulous care. 

From the Guild Hall let us go into the temple of the five 
hundred Buddhists. This is a large building around the 
walls of which are arranged in two rows great gilt images 
of Buddhist ancestral divinities, five hundred of them in all. 
Every face has a distinct individuality of its own, and they 
all have long ears that reach down almost to their shoulders, 
like a turkey's dewlaps. These long ears indicate longevity. 



FIVE HUNDRED ANCESTRAL GODS. 173 

"What surprised us most of all, was to find Marco Polo in 
this galaxy. This famous traveler has been admitted to the 
company of the gods, and he was honored with a stick of 
burning incense on the day we were in the temple, which was 
more than could be said for most of them. I think if I 
had intended to burn any incense in that temple, I should 
have put my stick in the little sand box before Marco Polo 
also. It is not certain that the features of this image resem- 
ble this first globe-trotter's, for whom it is supposed to stand, 
but it is probably quite as authentic as many of the pictures 
and statues of the famous men of antiquity. 

One other old fellow among the gods also attracted my 
attention. He had eyebrows that reached almost down to 
his chin, and from all that I could gather, he was famous 
chiefly for his eyebrows, which have never been duplicated 
since. 

In the middle aisle of the hall of the five hundred Bud- 
dhist gods is a fine bronze pagoda, in which are three great 
bronze images. While we were in the temple a service was 
going on, and four priests were marching around the bronze 
images, beating their tomtoms and chanting in a most dole- 
ful and lugubrious tone of voice. Among all the dispirited 
fellows I ever saw these priests would carry off the palm. 
They had a little curiosity about us, who were the only vis- 
itors to the temple at the time, but no interest in the service 
that they were performing. They must beat their tomtoms 
so many times ; they must wail out their hideous chant so 
many times more, but they evidently considered it a most 
unpleasant job, and desired to get through it with as little 
expenditure of nervous energy as possible. I shall never 
forget the faces of two of those priests, so utterly dispirited 
were they, so completely and profoundly indifferent to what 
they were doing ! 



174 THE SORDID SPIRIT OF BUDDHISM. 

It seems to me that the sight was representative of the 
decadence of the Buddhist religion everywhere. Whatever 
it may have been in the past, it certainly has little hold on 
the affections of the people to-day. The idols are worshiped 
with no thought of love or real reverence but with the hope 
of gain. The incense is burned and the prayers are offered 
for the sake of good luck, and there is no more sense of 
reverence or worship, or affectionate recognition of a higher 
power on the part of these devotees, so far as I could learn, 
than there is in the hearts of those at home, who, partly 
for fun and partly because of their superstition, hang out the 
horseshoe over the front door, or insist on seeing the moon 
over their right shoulder when she first appears. Worship 
appears to be universal in such a city as Canton. Every 
store, every house, and every boat has its god, its shrine, 
and its incense ; yet it is simply the god of Good Luck who 
is worshiped ; only the deity of Prosperity who is invoked. 

Let us go to another temple before we get through with 
Canton. This shall be the "Temple of Horrors," which, 
singularly enough, is situated on the street of " Benevolence 
and Love." It is the most popular temple in the city, 
whether because of the horrors which are artistically ar- 
ranged at each side or because of the fortune tellers, ped- 
dlers, gamblers, and quacks who have their stalls there, I am 
not able to say. This seems to be the favorite resort of the 
dentists also, for I saw several of their ilk with long strings 
of extracted molars and grinders at least thirty feet in 
length, which looked like ghastly necklaces. There were a 
few people paying their vows to the idols, but the one who 
interested me most was a woman of high caste who toddled 
in on the tiniest of tiny feet. If her feet w T ere small she 
made up for it at the other end of her person, for her hair 
was dressed in the latest and extremest style, ornamented 



IN THE HEIGHT OF THE FASHION. 175 

with all kinds of rich and costly ornaments. Her face was 
painted in most brilliant colors and there was a patch of 
brilliant carmine on her lower lip. Her clothing was silk of 
various bright colors, and she was evidently gotten up with- 
out regard to expense. On her tiny toes she could not walk 
alone, but had a servant on each side to steady her as she 
went up the steps. She appeared as indifferent to the god 
who was grinning from the rear end of the temple as any of 
the rest, but coolly sent one of her servants to light some in- 
cense and place the bundle of sticks in the sand box beneath 
the god's nose. Then she got a slip referring to a number, 
which number the priest consulted and gave her the proph- 
ecy which she sought. The priestly oracle frequently 
couches his words in very ambiguous phrases which will 
answer for one thing about as well as another; but after 
getting her slip of paper which told her fortune, she toddled 
off once more, evidently well pleased with the news she had 
received, while the priests were equally satisfied with the 
silver bits which had come into their till. 

Everything about these temples is dirty and disorderly. 
There is no obeisance or indications of reverence on the 
part of the worshipers. They bustle around in the most 
business-like way, buy their incense, light it, place it in the 
proper receptacle, and then go off perfectly satisfied that 
they have done their duty. In all the smaller temples 
which I saw in China, the same disregard, indifference, and 
irreverence were exhibited. The priests looked utterly 
weary and dispirited and evidently thought life was not 
worth living. The worshipers only sought good fortune 
and success in business. The temples were often littered 
and dirty, and priest and worshiper alike were only con- 
cerned with what they could get out of the imposture. 
This temple is called the Temple of Horrors because of some 



176 THE BUDDHIST HADES. 

wax-work-like shows on either side of the entrance which 
leads up to it. I think Madame Tussaud must have gotten 
the idea of her underground Temple of Horrors in London 
from this temple in Canton, her's, to be sure, being rather 
more artistic and realistic. But this show has the advantage 
of being older, and the figures quite as true to life. 

In one of the little apartments two fiends are seen saw- 
ing a man in two from his head to his feet. The poor man 
who is being thus treated is inclosed between two boards, 
but he is turned sideways to the audience so that it can see 
the saw going through him. In another apartment transmi- 
gration is shown, and a man is being turned into a wolf, the 
creature as he appears being half man and half wolf. In 
still another section of this famous museum is a man 
strapped to the ground with the soles of his feet uppermost, 
while a hideous devil with a grin on his face bastinadoes 
him. Still another poor fellow has a red-hot bell coming 
down over his shrinking body which, evidently, will soon be 
reduced to a cinder, while another one is being boiled in oil. 
These are the punishments of the Buddhist hell. 

Another of the show places of Canton which we wish to 
see is the Examination Hall. Here every three years the 
examination of candidates for the second literary degree is 
held. All the students of the first degree in the whole 
province are required to compete at this examination, and I 
imagine it is the most extensive "exam" that is held in any 
portion of the world. As we enter the Examination Hall, 
we see on either side rows and rows of little cells which ex- 
tend back from the main passageway, seventy-five or a hun- 
dred of them in a row. These cells are h]/ 2 feet long and 
3^ feet wide, and number 11,616; but even this enormous 
number is not enough for all the candidates, and additional 
cells were furnished at the last triennial examination. 



THE GREAT TRIENNIAL EXAMINATION. 17? 

In these narrow closets the candidate for the second de- 
gree is imprisoned. He is given a chair and a diminutive 
table : a little earthen braiser with a few coals in it on 
which he can cook his rice and make his tea, and for three 
days he is not allowed to leave his cell except to go into the 
narrow passage which runs beside it. He must have no 
communication with any other student, and if he is caught 
with another man's essay or cheating in any way, he may 
lose his head, for aught I know. At any rate the punish- 
ment would be very severe. The examination begins on the 
eighth day of the eighth moon and occupies three sessions of 
three days each. The same text is given to all at daylight, 
and the essays must be handed in on the following morning. 
Out of these 12,000 Or more candidates, how many do you 
suppose pass the final examination? Only 130 on the 
average. The rest of the poor fellows who have used their 
time and brains for nothing are doomed to disappointment, 
but they can try for the degree again at the end of another 
three years if they choose, and again and again, and the 
most pathetic spectacle is to see old men of sixty and 
seventy years who have tried to pass the examination every 
three years since they were twenty, still hoping against 
hope. 

Those who pass, however, are well taken care of, for 
they are booked for promotion in civil offices, and are 
always required to go to Peking to compete for the third 
degree. If one passes this third degree, he is honored by all 
his relatives and by the whole clan. I have seen many 
a pole with fluttering flags set up in Chinese villages, indi- 
cating that the family which lives about that pole has a 
scholar of high rank among them, one who has passed an 
examination for the second or third degree. 

But what an absurd and useless waste of energy is re- 



178 



A WASTE OF ENERGY. 



quired to pass this examination? ISTothing of modern 
science is demanded, nothing of modern literature, nothing 
that will improve the body or the soul, or that will add to 
the sum total of the world's knowledge ; but simply an essay 
on some text of Confucius. This is the only door of en- 
trance to civil service promotion in China. This kind of 
civil service reform certainly needs itself to be reformed. 

Another interesting place in Canton is the Five-Storied 
Pagoda. Strickly speaking, it is not a pagoda at all, but 
looks more like a great brick barn. There are five stories to 
it, however, and from the topmost platform a magnificent 
view of the city, the great river, and the hills beyond can 
be seen. These hills are filled with graves of a semicircular 
shape, and from this place the tomb of a relative of Ma- 
hommed, who died in the seventh century, is visible. 

Perhaps we have seen enough for one morning, and after 
paying our bearers about twenty-five cents each for their 
services and our guide a reasonable sum for his time, we will 
find our way back to our friends, with most vivid recollec- 
tions of a morning in Canton. 




CHAPTER X. 

OUR JOURNEY UP THE GREAT RIVER. 

An Excursion in a Flower Boat — "Rice Power" — The Stern- Wheeler 
and its Motive Power — Sacrifices and Perils of the Missionary — A 
Chinese Feast — Chop Sticks and How to Use Them — Lamb and Chest- 
nuts — Frogs' Legs and Onions — A Dissipated Prejudice — Shrimps 
and Bamboo Root — Our Seventeen Courses — A Chinese Village — A 
Village School and Schoolmaster — Studying Aloud — A Pot and its 
Contents — How the Ashes of Grandfathers are saved in China — " Fe, 
Fi, Fo, Fum, I Smell the Blood of a Chinaman'' — Seventeen Dollars 
for a Child — A Fire-Cracker Factory — How Fire-Crackers are Made 
— Cheap Wages and Cheap Living — A Chinese Flower Garden — A 
Mandarin in His Blossom Gown — A Common Temple — Waking up 
the God — Washstands for a God — Lack of Reverence — Fans for Sick 
Relatives — The Voices of the Night — A Contrast. 




OST visitors to Canton confine their 
attention to the great city itself, 
and think they have seen it all 
when they have visited the Exam- 
ination Hall, the Temple of the 
Five Hundred Gods, the silk- 
weaving establishments, and the 
Five-Storied Pagoda ; but to me 
these were not the most interest- 
ing of the sights of this marvel- 
ous province, teeming with more 
population than any other equal 
section of the globe. It was our good fortune to be guests 
in a delightful missionary home while in Canton, and to 
see not only these stock sights, but to get some glimpses of 
Chinese life which not one visitor in a hundred is likely to 

see. 

(179) 



180 RICE POWER NAVIGATION. 

One day we bad an excursion up the great Pearl River 
in a Chinese house boat. This was a most unique experi- 
ence. The boat was a great lumbering ark of an affair, 
fitted up with kitchen and sitting-room, while the stained- 
glass windows, ebony and marble furniture, and tinkling 
chandeliers gave it quite a gorgeous appearance. Slowly 
and wearisomely the coolies made their way up the river 
just as their ancestors had done for a thousand years past. 
Our boat, like all the other thousands on the river, was pro- 
pelled by " rice power," as one of our friends said. Steam 
power has not yet been introduced on the Pearl River, 
except for a few steam launches. Electric power is still un- 
unknown, but " rice power," exerted through the muscles of 
men and women, is still the propelling force on the Canton 
or Pearl River. 

Every now and then a splashing stern-wheel boat would 
pass us. At first it appeared almost like a Mississippi River 
steamer of rude design, with water flying from the paddle 
wheel behind, but on looking more closely, we could see that 
the machinery was worked by sixteen coolies, who constantly 
shuffled through their monotonous round like poor horses in 
a treadmill. But even this is an invention of very late years, 
and is considered a great innovation by most of the inhabit- 
ants. A long sweep fastened to a short staple in the bow 
of the boat is still the ordinary means of propulsion. 

Every few minutes our coolies w T ould stop to refresh 
themselves with a cup of tea, or a whiff or two from their 
pipes, which, by the way, only hold a pinch of tobacco. 
They all seemed to be very good-tempered and able-bodied 
fellows. One or two of them had brawny arms that would 
rejoice the heart of a pugilist. Past the rice fields, past vil- 
lages, past toiling coolies endlessly pumping water for irri- 
gation, past luxuriant gardens where every square inch of 



COURAGE AND SELF-SACRIFICE. 181 

soil is cultivated, we slowly made our way. Some of my 
missionary friends spend much of their time in the villages 
hundreds of miles up the river, for this is a great water way 
which branches out in every direction and affords access to 
the very heart of this great province. I would like to intro- 
duce the scoffers at missionary work to these self-sacrificing 
men and women who have left their home and friends 
behind them, and are spending their lives in the foul atmos- 
phere of a pagan country, not for a few short weeks or 
months, but for a lifetime, in order to win some of these 
people to Christ. 

Many a time have these missionaries taken their lives 
in their hands. Though there is now but little danger in 
most of the villages there are some which it is not safe for 
them to visit. Many times have some of them been stoned 
out of the villages where they attempted to preach the Gos- 
pel, but they still persevered and are satisfied that the time 
will come when this marvelous people, who have retained 
their ancient civilization for so many centuries, will be 
equally stable in their new Christian civilization. 

At length, in the course of this novel picnic, dinner time 

comes and my friends have promised me a genuine Chinese 

feast. Let us sit down together to this feast. We are not 

allowed to have knives and forks or spoons, but simply 

chop sticks and a little porcelain ladle, with which we help 

ourselves out of the common dish in the middle of the 

table. Would you learn how to use these chop sticks ? 

then follow these directions implicitly. Put the lower stick 

across the thumb, holding it firmly between the thumb 

and first finger. Place the second chop stick over this, 

allowing it to be flexible and to wriggle as you desire it. 

After considerable practice you may be able to convey a 

piece of fish from the central dish to your mouth without a 
12 



182 A GENUINE CHINESE FEAST. 

catastrophe on the way. The great secret of eating with 
chop sticks is to keep the lower stick stiff and inflexible; but 
a foreigner's muscles being ill-trained, it is apt to waver and 
slip, which is fatal to all successful efforts. 

After waiting a considerable time for the dignified cooks 
to make ready, oranges and bananas are brought on for the 
first course. These required no great skill, for we are 
allowed to take them in our hands and eat them as at any 
other time. But now comes a difficult task. A soup with 
mushrooms, melons, rice, and barley, is next brought on and 
placed in a bowl in the center of the table. Each one takes 
his little porcelain ladle and dips for himself in the common 
bowl, while the larger particles of mushrooms and melons he 
must fish out with his chop sticks. The third course is 
boiled chicken stuffed with chestnuts and rice. This is so 
completely cooked that the least little touch with the chop 
sticks breaks it into pieces, and we each fish out for ourselves 
what we can from the common dish. When secured it is 
most toothsome and savory, I assure you. 

Stuffed pigeons constitute the fourth course. They are 
somewhat like the chickens, only dressed in a different way. 
Fish wrapped in something that resembles a sausage skin 
constitutes the fifth course, and a very good course it is. 
The sixth course is lamb and chestnuts ; seventh course, 
matai, a vegetable that is crisp and very pleasant to the 
taste. Duck and ham furnish the eighth' course, and with 
each new dish our plates are changed, though we are al- 
lowed to retain the same chop sticks. Frogs' legs stewed in 
onions are then placed upon the table. 

Some of the ladies of the party told the Chinese servants 
to be sure and let them know when the frogs appeared that 
they might decline that course ; but when they thought to 
mention the matter, they were politely informed that the 



SEVENTEEN COURSES. 183 

frogs had already been eaten, and they remembered, when 
it was too late to remedy it, that they had enjoyed that 
course better than any other. Thus our prejudices are dissi- 
pated, sometimes unconsciously. But why frogs should be 
any more distasteful than turtles or oysters or fish, I have 
never been able to determine. 

The tenth course is rice, just simple, unadulterated boiled 
rice. Why it should be thus honored in the middle of the 
feast, I am not aware. This is followed by a course of 
shrimps stewed with onions and bamboo root, which is very 
palatable. The twelfth course is pickles ; the thirteenth, 
bananas ; the fourteenth, another mushroom soup ; the fif- 
teenth, a kind of a dish made of shrimps, pork, and other 
meat mixed and boiled together. The sixteenth is sponge 
cake, and the seventeenth mandarin oranges. By this time 
you can imagine that the capacities of the missionaries were 
sorely taxed, and even the gastronomic capabilities of their 
guests were tried to the utmost extent. However, this was 
not all, for in order to do full justice to the Chinese feast, we 
must not forget that we are in the land of tea, and in a little 
while, dainty and delicate cups of it are brought on to con- 
clude the banquet. 

A little way back from the river are many Chinese 
villages which for the most part are embowered in trees. 
The tiled roofs look so much like the surface of the ground 
that it is difficult at a little distance to find where the village 
begins and the fields leave off. If we get into the village, 
however, we shall find it teeming with life. 

On this trip up the Pearl river we have an excellent 
opportunity to visit one of these villages. In the missionary 
district which is covered by one of my friends who is in the 
boat with us, are thirty thousand of these villages. Of 
course he could not preach in all of them in one year or 



184 



STREETS SPANNED BY AN UMBRELLA. 



in a hundred years, but they are all open to his ministra- 
tions. From a distance these villages look somewhat pictur- 
esque, but the enchantment vanishes on nearer approach. If 
the streets of Hong Kong are narrow and the streets of 
Canton narrower, the streets of these villages should be 




ON THE PEARL RIVER. 



compared in the superlative degree, for indeed they are the 
narrowest of all. Two people can scarcely walk abreast in 
many of them. I had in my hand when visiting one of 
them, an ordinary umbrella which exactly spanned the dis- 
tance from wall to wall in many streets, while the widest 
ones were about six inches wider than the length of my 
umbrella. The pavement is broken and shattered and horri- 
ble filth is everywhere. 

As we passed along the street in the village, we heard a 
great noise of voices reciting in a humdrum, sing-song way, 
something which was of course unintelligible to us. 

" That is a school," said my friend ; " let us look in." So 
we unceremoniously entered, which we found we were at 



A PRIMARY SCHOOL. 185 

perfect liberty to do, and saw twenty little urchins who, at 
the top of their voices, were shouting some sentences from 
Confucius. The schoolmaster did not appear at first, but 
after we had been standing looking in at the door for a 
moment, finding from the slight cessation of noise, which 
was due to curiosity of the students who could not recite 
and look at us at the same time, that there was something 
going on, he came out of the back room of the school build- 
ing. 

He was very polite and courteous and invited us to come 
in and take a seat. He explained to us that the pupils 
learned the words, but that they had no idea of their mean- 
ing. After they had thoroughly committed them, he in- 
terpreted the meaning of the passage, and then gave them 
a new one to learn. They cannot do this silently, however,, 
but the louder they shout the quicker they seem to learn 
their lessons. Most of the schoolmasters throughout the 
empire are those who have passed the first examination, but 
are among the vast majority of those who have not passed 
the second and who, in all probability, never will. It is for- 
tunate that some occupation is open to them, though the 
teacher of the common school is not a very exalted person- 
age in China. 

"What does that large earthen pot contain?" I said to 
my friend as we came out of the school. " Oh, that is the 
ancestral jar, containing the ashes of the grandfathers of the 
people who live in this house," he said. 

Thus we made our way through this crowded little 
village. The women carme to the door of their little hovels 
to stare at us, the children scuttled awa}^ as though we were 
the arch enemies of mankind. Doubtless many of them 
have been taught by their parents to believe that foreigners 
will make away with all of them if they can only get then' 



180 FOREIGN OGRES. 

hands upon them. Every foreigner, in the estimation of the 
lower orders of Chinese, is a great ogre who is constantly 
saying, when he comes into a Chinese village, 

" Fe, fi, fo, fum, 

" I smell the blood of a Chinaman," 

•and these little folks had evidently been taught to keep out 
of harm's way. 

"When the heathen Chinese wish to damage the reputa- 
tion of the missionary, they persuade their simple-minded 
countrymen that the missionaries wish the eyes and hair 
and livers of their children to make up into medicine, and 
that they must not send their children to the mission 
schools. A friend of mine took a poor little child, whose 
mother had died and whose father was a worthless scamp, 
m order that she might bring up this child in a decent way. 
For several months she watched over it carefully, and gave 
it the best of Chinese nurses, but one sad clay for the baby 
the wretched father happened around, caught up the child, 
-carried it off, and sold it for $17, in order to satisfy one of 
his creditors. The selling of children is a very common 
thing among the lower class of the Chinese, and infanticide 
is still practiced in some of the provinces to a frightful ex- 
tent. No wonder, with such Bluebeard-like stories for nm\ 
ser}^ tales, that the little slant-eyed urchins got out of our 
way as rapidly as they could. 

On our way from the village we passed a firecracker fac- 
tory, in which I am sure the boys of America will be inter- 
ested. In the rear room of the factory were piles of coarse 
brown paper. By a very simple process this paper is made 
into tubes of the right size for different kinds of firecrackers, 
while in still another room a dozen men and girls were 
putting in the powder, tamping in the brick dust on top, and 
making a great clatter about it with their little mallets. 



CHINESE CHEAP LABOR. 187 

Most of this work is done by hand, though some rude 
machinery is used. It has been a mystery to me, ever 
since the first Fourth of July that I can remember, how fire- 
crackers could be made and sent over to America to be sold 
for five cents a bunch. The mystery is scarcely diminished 
when we see the work performed, and note that so much of 
it is hand labor. I suppose the real explanation lies in the 
cheapness of labor. Wages, I am told, do not average more 
than ten cents per day, equivalent to seven cents of our 
money ; but even on this the coolies can supply themselves 
with scanty food and sufficient clothing for this climate, and, 
perhaps, lay by a few dollars for the rainy day which people 
in China, as well as in America, are always fearing. 

The real secret of Chinese cheap labor is Chinese cheap 
living. Hotels in China which charge $4.00 a day for their 
guests and $1.00 a day for European servants will board 
Chinese servants for twenty cents a day, and then make 
money. I cannot say, however, that this poor and monoto- 
nous life, as it doubtless is, has any deteriorating effect, 
physically, on the Chinese. They seem usually to be strong 
and healthy, and unless addicted to opium smoking, as many 
of them are, they are often fine specimens of a vigorous 
physical manhood. How a coolie can support life, and do 
the tremendously hard labor which is expected of him six- 
teen hours out of the twenty-four, on a little rice and fish, 
surpasses the foreigner's comprehension ; and yet that it can 
be done is proved hj the hundred of millions of robust peo- 
ple in all parts of the Chinese Empire. 

On our way from the village we went into a Chinese 
flower garden. These abound in the vicinity of Canton, and 
are really very beautiful. Everything is on a diminutive 
scale. Flowering shrubs, orange trees, lemon trees, azalias, 
and chrysanthemums are all of the dwarf variety. Many 



188 BLOSSOMING MANDARINS. 

orange trees growing in pots are loaded with little oranges 
no larger than the end of one's thumb. But the most curi- 
ous thing about these flower gardens is the shapes into 
which the shrubs are trained. On many branches we found 
huge goggle eyes pinned, while from the lower branches, 
porcelain hands reach out to us in a ghostly way. Below 
the hands were often a pair of porcelain feet resting on the 
soil. We found that in this way was constructed the skele- 
ton of a floral mandarin, who, after a few weeks, as the 
blossoms opened on the branches, would be clothed in a 
gorgeous dress of white or red or yellow bloom. Some of 
the mandarins had already blossomed out, and their heads 
and hands and porcelain feet appeared from a beautiful 
dress of living green and brilliant flowers. There were also 
in this garden lions and unicorns, foxes and buffaloes, with 
flowery skins, and goggle eyes of porcelain. The whole 
effect was very curious. 

A Chinese mandarin clothed in flowers, or a lion or uni- 
corn in the same beautiful dress, if displayed in a New 
York florist's window, would attract such a crowd that the 
police would have to clear the way. There were many 
other beautiful things in this garden, fountains and arch- 
ways, bridges over little streams, and flowery pagodas, mak- 
ing it as picturesque and beautiful a place as could be found 
in our most extensive establishments in England or America. 

As we came out of the garden we passed along the bor- 
ders of canals and roads lined with orange and lemon trees 
and the beautiful carambola, with its three-cornered yellow 
fruit as large as an apple hanging in rich profusion from its 
branches. The carambolas were just ripe at the time of 
our visit to Canton, and the deep yellow, luscious fruit shin- 
ing through the green leaves made as pretty an orchard 
effect as one would wish to see. 



THE GRIMY GODS OF CHINA. 189 

On our way back to our missionary home, we stepped 
into one of the common temples, not a great, gorgeous 
temple such as we have seen in Canton, but a more modest, 
suburban shrine. A beautiful grove of trees surrounded it, 
but within the temple was the same squalor and dirt, indif- 
ference and irreverence, that we have seen elsewhere. 
There was, to be sure, a gong to be rung, and a big drum to 
be beaten in order to wake up the god, and by his side were 
many votive offerings. In one temple that we visited, the 
god had been favored with several washstands fitted up with 
copper basins. From the looks of his time-begrimed face 
Ave thought he needed to use these presents. Another god 
had several suits of clothing presented to him. These hung 
on a chair near by, though from their appearance we judged 
that he had never put them on. Still another had a hand- 
some sedan chair among his gifts, so that he could take a 
ride if he wished. 

The god of medicine is assiduously fanned by many of 
his worshipers, and these fans are taken home to be used by 
his friends in fanning 1 their sick relatives, thus bringing; the 
breath of the god near to them. 

That such an intelligent, practical, sensible people, as the 
Chinese undoubtedly are in many ways, should still adhere 
to these absurd and silly superstitions, can only be accounted 
for by the fact that few of them have ever heard of any- 
thing better, and that the religion of Christ in this vast 
empire has yet had time to make but little headway. 

Soon we are again at the kind home which opens to us its 
hospitable doors after a most delightful day on the river and 
in the country, tired enough, as we thought, to go to bed 
and sleep soundly in spite of the voices of the night, which 
are not so poetical as in some sections of the globe. Yet we 
hear until well on towards midnight the clanging of the 



190 IN THE NIGHT WATCHES. 

gongs from the Buddhist temples on either side of our 
friend's home, alternating with the beating of cymbals, for 
this has been a high day and the god must be worshiped far 
into the night. 

Every now and then a louder bang indicates the report 
of a gun, which we are told is fired by the watchman on his 
rounds to let the thieves know that he is in their vicinity and 
that they had better keep out of his wa} 7 ", a very convenient 
thing for the thieves, as it seems to us. Thus, with the bang 
of gun and beat of drum, and clash of cymbals, our senses 
grow drowsy as we recall to mind the events of the day that 
has passed, and we thank God for a religion that appeals to 
the head as well as to the heart, to the conscience and not to 
superstition, to the love of God and not to an undefined fear 
of evil, to the desire for holiness and not to the hope of gain. 
These are the lessons which the tom-toms and the fire-crack- 
ers, the gongs and the drums of the Buddhist temples, teach 
us in the watches of the night. 



0^h 




CHAPTEE XL 

OUR STAY IN CHARMING JAPAN — SOCIAL CUSTOMS — SOME 
INTERESTING PERSONAL EXPERIENCES — LIFE AND 
SCENES ON A TEA PLANTATION. 

The Best Preparation for a New Land — A Terrible Typhoon — Personal 
Experiences — "The Lord is Able to Give Thee Much More Than 
This" — The Most Beautiful of Mountains — Fujiyama in Spotless 
Ermine — "Fiery Jack" — Yokohama — The Rush of Jinrikishas — 
The Capture of the Mau-of- War's Men — Fun in the Custom House — 
" Crossing the Palm " — A Lesson in Japanese Politeness — Bowing in 
Japanese — The Shop-keeper's Salaam — The Maid Servant's Obeisance 

— Receiving Callers — A Hinge in the Spine — The Ohio Statesman's 
Mistake— "My Fool of a Wife" — Japanese Railways — Our Fellow 
Passengers — Progressive Japan — Telegraph Lines and Electric Lights 

— Postal Delivery Six Times a Day — Protecting the Windows — The 
Professor's Many Suits — The " Obi" — A Japanese Joseph — What we 
Saw from the Car Window — A Tea Plantation. 




(OTHING so well prepares the trav- 
eler for an introduction to any 
new land as a long and stormy 
journey thitherward by sea. Even 
the desert of Sahara would be 
welcome under such circum- 
stances ; how much more the 
beautiful shores of smiling Japan. 
So far as previous preparation 
is concerned, we were made 
amply ready by the long and 
stormy voyage from Hong Kong. 
Earely has so much tempestuous discomfort been com- 
pressed into the seven days between Hong Kong and 
Yokohama. 

As we neared the coast of Japan, a fearful typhoon 

(191) 



192 THROUGH THE CENTER OF THE TYPHOON. 

which had been following in our wake for several days, 
making only a little more rapid time than the steamer itself, 
overtook us. The barometer dropped to the lowest point 
•ever known in these latitudes, and about ten o'clock on the 
night of November 23d, the wind began to blow with " ty- 
phoon force." For several days before, the wind had been 
" blowing a gale," according to the captain's log book, but 
on this night the demons of the air seemed to take to them- 
selves seventy times seven spirits worse than the first, and 
the way they shrieked and howled and screamed through 
the rigging will never be forgotten by the passengers of the 
Peru. Hoping the storm might blow by, Captain Ward at 
first " hove to," to speak after the manner of sailors, but, 
fearing that we might drift upon the rocks of the Loochoo 
Islands, he soon put on all steam again, and drove his good 
ship directly through the center of the typhoon, in order to 
get sufficient sea room. 

As is well known, a typhoon is a circular storm of lim- 
ited extent, which revolves about a comparatively calm area. 
After plowing our way through the eastern edge of the 
typhoon for some two hours, we struck the calmer center, 
and for a little while the passengers congratulated them- 
selves that the storm was over. But, alas ! our congratula- 
tions were premature, for, after half an hour of comparative 
quiet, the Peru dashed into the western edge of the cyclone, 
and all the demons in the rigging began to scream and howl 
and shriek with redoubled fury. For two hours more it was 
with the greatest difficulty that we kept in our berths, hold- 
ing to the storm braces with both hands, and thus prevent- 
ing ourselves from being pitched headlong into the mass of 
trunks and rugs, tumblers and water bottles, hairbrushes 
and life preservers, which were jumbled together in inde- 
scribable confusion upon the state-room floor. 



FUJIYAMA, THE BEAUTIFUL. 193 

As the gray dawn began to show in what part of the 
•state-room the window was situated, the wind somewhat 
moderated, but the waves were as high as ever. Reaching 
down into the confused mass of debris which lay on the 
state-room floor, Mrs. Pilgrim picked up one of the calen- 
dars which our thoughtful friends at home had given us, with 
the following cheering message for November twenty-fourth 
(Thanksgiving day, by the way), " The Lord is able to give 
thee much more than this." 

Never did that promise from Holy Writ have such a sin- 
ister significance before. However, as the storm cleared 
away and the sun appeared later in the day, and as the 
waves somewhat moderated, though still " mountainous," 
according to the log book of the Peru, we felt the promise 
was not so inappropriate after all, and there were man}?" 
things to be thankful for on this Thanksgiving Day, even 
though the rolling, pitching dinner table did prevent our 
doing full justice to the Thanksgiving turkey and cranberry 
sauce. 

After this experience, it can readity be seen that we 
eagerly awaited the first glimpse of the lovely shores of 
Japan. 

Early on the morning of November twenty-sixth, they 
broke upon us. There was Fujiyama, the most beautiful 
mountain in the world, which figures on innumerable screens 
and fans and teacups, rising before us in all his regal 
splendor. No wonder that the Japanese love their sacred 
mountain ; a far more dull and phlegmatic people would have 
their veins stirred by such a sight. 

This first view of Fujiyama which we enjoyed was per- 
haps the best that could be obtained. The early snow of 
approaching winter clothed him in a spotless ermine mantle 
to his very feet. Every part of this most symmetrical and 



194 OUR WELCOME TO JAPAN. 

lovely cone was of dazzling Avhiteness, and, as the Eastern 
sun arose, a rosy tinge spread its glow from the topmost 
crater to the lowest fringe of the glistening garment. 

On the other side of the steamer a volcano was puffing 
out huge volumes of smoke. " Fiery Jack " the sailors called 
it. On both sides the carefully cultivated fields of this park- 
like fairy land came down close to the water's edge. Little 
sailboats and Japanese junks danced about us on every side. 
Everything on sea and shore looked its brightest and best. 
The terrors of the stormy passage were forgotten, and we 
felt that nature conspired with the experiences of the past 
few days to make our welcome to Japan most bright and 
memorable. 

A few hours later and the Peru dropped her anchor 
in Yokohama harbor, and we gladly exchanged the deck of 
the ship for more substantial terra firma. 

Yokohama, with its large English concession, its substan- 
tial warehouses, and its harbor full of the vessels of all 
nations, is not a typical Japanese city, and yet there are 
many things to interest the traveler, who has not as yet been 
sated with the temples and palaces, the picturesque villages 
and beautiful natural scener} r of fair Japan. 

For instance, as we stepped ashore from the steam launch 
a whole army of jinrikisha men came after us, each insisting 
that we should patronize his particular baby carriage. But 
first our baggage had to be passed through the Custom 
House, and we were obliged for a time to disappoint our 
eager friends, who served as hackmen and horses combined. 

While Ave were undergoing the trying ordeal of a Custom 
House inspection some fifty sailors from a British man-of- 
war rowed ashore. Then what rushing and jamming and 
pushing and shouting there was on the part of the jinrikisha 
men! The eager cabmen at Forty-second street station, 



CURIOUS OFFICIALS. 195 

New York, are not to be compared to their brethren of 
Yokohama. Two jinrikisha men pitched upon each jolly 
tar and bore him away bodily to one of the little carriages 
in waiting, and in less time than it takes to tell the story 
every sailor was bundled into a jinrikisha and whisked 
away ; we fear to no very reputable abiding place, for land- 
sharks abound in Yokohama as in every seaport, and the 
jinrikisha men have the reputation of being subsidized by the 
worst of them. 

Going through the Custom House is oftentimes a serious 
matter in Japan, not that the duties are very high, but the 
Custom House officials' curiosity is very great. Anything 
done up in a bundle seemed to excite their suspicion at once, 
and they took a boyish delight in finding out that one pack- 
age contained a few worthless seashells, another a set of 
chess men, each one of which had to be taken from its box 
and examined separately, and still another, a double Chinese 
sword, which one official took from its sheath and made 
playful lunges at all the others who surrounded him. 

However, a little harmless curiosity on the part of these 
youthful inspectors is a venial fault compared with the rude- 
ness and corruption of many of our customs officials at 
home. One can afford to spend a little time at the Custom 
House while the inmost recesses of his trunks are being ran- 
sacked, if only he is treated with politeness meanwhile, 
and is not brazenly asked to "to cross the palm 1 ' of the official, 
as I have been invited to do ere this in New York city. 

Now that we have actually set foot on Japanese soil, we 
may as well take a lesson in Japanese politeness, for from 
the lowest porter to the emperor himself this is an ingrained 
characteristic, and unless we are careful, our brusque and 
prompt western way may shock this courtliest of all 
peoples. 



196 A LESSON IN POLITENESS. 

Even the Custom House officials bow low when we 
present our keys and request them to examine our trunks, 
and the jinrikisha men almost bend themselves to the dust 
before us in their polite entreaties that we favor them with 
our patronage. 

As we go up the street, if we step into a Japanese store 
to buy so much as a sheet of paper, we are greeted witli 
a low salaam by the proprietor, who deems it quite awkward 
to go directly to business without a few polite preliminary 
genuflections. 

When we reach our boarding-house a smiling man-ser- 
vant stands upon the piazza to take our baggage with the 
most gracious bow, and the door is opened by a maid-ser- 
vant who almost touches the floor with her forehead, so low 
is her obeisance as she admits us within the penetralia. 

When we go upon the platform to make an address our 
audience often rises and bows, and when we begin to speak 
it is the proper thing to make as low a salute as our Ameri- 
can stiffness and previous training will allow. Upon this 
the audience all bow most graciously once more. At the 
conclusion of the address the speaker bows again, and the 
audience returns the salute. 

But it is when we receive callers that the most trying 
politeness is expected. The caller bows and we bow, and 
then the caller bows again and we bow still lower. Again, 
our Japanese visitor bends his body in a third genuflection, 
and we follow suit, doing our best to boio in Japanese if we 
cannot speak Japanese. 

If we were well trained we should not lift up our stooping 
figure until our visitor had begun to raise himself from his 
salutatory posture, and we furtively glance out of the corners 
of our eyes to see if he is not almost through with his bow- 
ing. Sometimes a peculiar little gutteral grunt indicates 



GENUFLECTIONS AND CIRCUMLOCUTIONS. 197 

that the visitor has finished his genuflections, and that we 
can raise our own bodies to an upright posture with pro- 
priety. I very much fear that I have many times broken 
all the laws in the Japanese code of propriety and courtesy, 
but I trust I shall be forgiven, and that my rudeness will be 
charged to a lack of early training, and to my imperfect 
western notions of civility. 

One important factor in the Japanese obeisance is to get 
the hinge in the right part of j^our anatomy. The brusque 
Yankee and stiff Englishman bow simply with their heads 
and the hinge they use is at the top of their spinal columns, 
but no such indifferent bobbing of the head will satisfy the 
Japanese demands. One must put the hinge lower doAvn, at 
the base of his spinal column, and bow with his whole body 
instead of the top of his head. A few days of practice will 
make one fairly proficient in this superficial part of the 
Japanese code of etiquette. 

But not only is their politeness a matter of bows and 
genuflections ; it is as fully indicated in their language. 
There is a polite language which is quite different from that 
used on ordinary occasions, and cannot even be understood 
by those familiar only with the colloquial tongue. Even the 
humblest people use the politest circumlocutions on every 
possible occasion. 

For instance, when we knock at the door, the person 
inside cries out "Ohairi," which means, "We welcome your 
honorable return." "When one greets a friend on the street 
he says, " Ohayo," which means literally, " Honorable 
early " ; or if translated into Irish it would be : " The top o' 
the mornin' to yez ! " 

It is said an Ohio statesman was once sent to a certain 
port in Japan as consul. As he landed on the shores of the 
country which was to be his home he heard one and another 



198 BY RAIL TO TOKIO. 

say in very good English as he thought, Ohio (Ohayo). " I 
declare," said this son of the Buckeye state, "I knew they 
were a well educated people in this land, but I didn't suppose 
they knew the very state I came from." 

A friend of mine tells me that his Japanese servant came 
to him one day and said, as he bowed low to the floor, "Will 
my most worthy master suffer his most humble servant to 
visit the honorable bath that he may wash his filthy body?" 
It is needless to say that after such a polite request permis- 
sion was at once granted. 

Japanese politeness consists not only in loading the per- 
sons spoken to with all kinds of complimentary adjectives, 
but also in depreciating one's self. Such a colloquy as this is 
often heard in Japanese highwa} T s : 

"How is your honorable wife this morning?" 

"I thank you, honorable sir, my fool of a wife is very 
Avell this morning." 

And yet the second speaker may be a most loving and 
exemplary husband ; he only wishes to be properly polite in 
depreciating his own. 

There is not very much to detain one in Yokohama, and 
w r e will soon take the train for Tokio, distant one hour by 
rail. There seems to be an incongruity between the rush- 
ing, bustling life of a railway station, and the Oriental 
throngs that crowd it. The wooden clogs, worn by men, 
women, and children, clatter on the stone floor of the station 
like so many castanets and make almost a deafening sound. 
Instead of spruce business men and "tailor-made girls," such 
as one is accustomed to see thronging our railway cars at 
home, people clad in practically the same garb which was in 
fashion a thousand years ago, step into these most modern of 
all vehicles to be whirled away as fast as steam can carry 
them. Something seems to be out of place; whether the 



PROGRESSIVE MODERN JAPAN. 199 

Japanese costume and wooden clogs, or our nineteenth cen- 
tury mode of locomotion, I shall not pretend to say. 

However, there seems to be no thought of incongruity on 
the part of our fellow passengers, for the Japanese have 
taken to railroads and steamships, to telephones and electric 
lights, as though they were to the manner born. 

The modern Japanese is nothing if not progressive. 
Every new invention, every latest labor-saving contrivance, 
he is ready to examine and adopt if it commends itself to 
his judgment. Well-appointed railroads connect one end of 
Japan with another. A perfect network of telegraph wires 
connect all leading cities. Incandescent electric lights often 
flash from the most humble stores and dwellings. In the 
leading cities the postman delivers his message six times a 
day, and wherever we go we find that Japan's senses are all 
alert to the first intimations of progress in any direction. 

In some respects the Japanese railway system is even 
better than ours. At least, more care is taken of life and 
limb, no grade crossings are allowed at stations, and fatal 
accidents are of very rare occurrence. 

The cars are mostly after the English pattern, and di- 
vided into first, second, and third-class compartments. The 
first-class compartments are very rarely used in Japan, even 
by "lords, fools, and Americans." In fact, after riding 
many hundred miles on Japanese railroads, I remember to 
have seen but a single occupant of a first-class carriage. 
The second-class is used somewhat sparingly, while the third- 
class on every train is crowded with vivacious Japanese 
travelers. 

As glass is a modern invention which, strangely enough, 
has not been largely introduced into country districts, Jap- 
anese windows generally being made of rice paper, the glass 
car windows in third-class compartments are crossed with 



200 OUR FELLOW PASSENGERS. 

lines of white paint, so that native travelers from the rural 
districts, who never saw glass before, may not unwittingly 
put their heads through the windows. The bills of the Im- 
perial Railway Company for broken glass became so large 
that at last this device for showing the rural passenger that 
there was something between him and the outside world 
was adopted. 

If you please, my readers, we will take a second-class 
car to Tokio, and, without being rude, we can furtively ex- 
amine our fellow passengers and their attire. After a few 
days we shall become so accustomed to the national dress 
it will be difficult for us to describe it ; so we must make 
the most of our first impressions. 

On the seat in front of us is a Japanese gentleman in 
European clothes, but his ill-fitting coat and shabby Derby 
hat are not nearly so picturesque as the garments of the 
friend by his side. ISTot being a woman or a man milliner, I 
cannot describe these garments with very good effect, but 
must content myself with saying that our Japanese-clad fel- 
low passenger wears tight-fitting trousers, nearly hidden by 
a loose upper garment coming nearly to his feet, and bound 
about the waist by a kind of scarf. 

In fact, our friend on the opposite seat, since it is cold 
weather, seems to wear several upper garments, for this is a 
way the Japanese have of keeping warm. They do not 
build fires or introduce steam heat, or even close their win- 
dows and doors, but they add one garment to another, until 
it is difficult to tell how laro-e the kernel under the many 
husks may be. The story is told of a professor in a famous 
school who had the reputation of wearing more clothes than 
any other man on the faculty. The students, exaggerating 
the truth, as students will, circulated the story that he com- 
monly wore thirtv-one suits of clothes. A friend of mine; 



SUPERFLUOUS COATS. 



201 



made bold to approach, him on the subject, telling him the 
story that was circulating among the students, whereupon 
he gravely replied that he could not account for such a 
report, as he had never, to his knowledge, worn more than 
thirteen suits at one time, unless the students had transposed 
the figures (31 for 13), and so the mistake had arisen. 

But the gentleman in front of us in the car probably 
wears not more than half a dozen garments on this journey, 
and makes up for his superfluous coats by wearing nothing 




DRESS OF JAPANESE WOMEN, SHOWING THE OBI. 

on his head. On entering the car he slips off his wooden 
shoes very easily, as they are only held on his feet by a cord 
passing between his big toe and the next one ; then, putting 
his stocking feet on the foot- warmer filled with hot water, 
the only method of heating these cars, he settles himself 
comfortably for his journey. 

]STot far from the gentleman opposite sits his wife. Her 
garments are, of course, quite beyond my powers of descrip- 
tion. It is only necessary to say that they are loose, flow- 
ing, and graceful, and that on her back is a curious affair 



->,,., 



AN INDICATION OF RANK. 



called an " obi," or sash, on which she greatly prides her- 
self. It is made of finest silk, and her rank in society is 
very largely indicated by the obi which she wears. Her 
head, too, is bare, though her profusion of black hair is so 
fantastically arranged that she does not need any other 
head-gear. On her feet are the same kind of clumsy wooden 
shoes her husband wears. 

Between them is their little child, the joy and pride, 




mmmwm 



i^Ai^iiaGMiiat 



A RURAL SCENE IN JAPAN. 



doubtless, of the father's and mother's heart. He is arrayed 
in a most gorgeous suit, a miniature reproduction of his 
mother's, only in brighter colors. Joseph himself was not 
more favored when a boy than this little Japanese lad. 

But the objects of special interest are not all within the 
car windows, by any means. "We never get tired of the 
ever-changing panorama without, made up of mountain and 
meadow, forest trees and cultivated fields, bright costumes 
and quaint cottages, and many a scene of rustic comfort and 
content. 




e « 



A CHARMING PANORAMA. 



205 



One of the most interesting sights is a tea plantation. 
Many of these we skirt in our railway journeys in Japan. 
The long row of tea plants look like the bunches of box with 
which the borders of old-fashioned flower gardens were once 
made, only the tea plants are much larger. When the crop is 
matured the tea garden is full of pickers, native men and 
women, in bright costumes, working side by side, their gay 
attire contrasting prettily with the fresh green of the tea 
leaves. These bright beings, who, we fear, are not as radi- 
ant as they look, stop their work as the train rumbles, by, to 
gaze after the retreating cars, stirred by the same wonder 
which a rushing railway train always excites in every part 
of the world, however common the sight may be. 

Thus we journey on, stopping at picturesque little vil- 
lages, with thatch-roofed cottages ; past miles and miles 
of fields cultivated with most accurate nicety, every one 
looking like a market garden in the suburbs of a great city ; 
past beautiful bamboo forests ; past shrines and large tem- 
ples and emblems of Buddhist worship, set up, as in the days 
of old, " under every green tree " ; past beautiful hills and 
fertile valleys, winding rivers and canals teeming with life, 
until, all too soon, so interesting is this brief journey, the 
cars roll into the station of the great city of Tokio — the 
largest in all the realm, the capital of the kingdom, the Mi- 
kado's city of the Mikado's empire. 




CHAPTER XII. 

THE MIKADO'S CITY AND THE MIKADO'S SUBJECTS. 

Tokio, its Parks, its Temples, and its Palace — Its University — A Study 
of Fish Parasites — What Missionaries have done — The Seismological 
Department — An Artificial Earthquake — Exceptional Earthquake 
Privileges — Wheat and Chaff — Canton and Tokio, or China versus 
Japan — The Frenchman of the East — A Japanese House — No Doors, 
No Windows, No Chimneys — A Walk in a Country Village — The 
Country Bakery — A Rice Mill — Division of Labor — An Initiation into 
the Art of Orange Eating — The Japanese Shoe Shop — The Villainous. 
Daikon — Prices in Japan — A Pot of Tea for Two Cents — A Japanese 
Dinner in a Japanese Hotel — The Curious Crowds at the Window — 
Character Studies — The Motormen of the East — Surprising Endurance 

— The Hilarious Jinrikisha Men — The Waitress and her Odd Position 

— Paying our Reckoning. 




(AMOUS and imposing as are its 
many "lions," the one thing that 
impressed me most strongly in 
Tokio was the Imperial Univer- 
sity. To find in this Oriental 
land a university in many re- 
spects the peer of Cambridge or 
Oxford, Heidelberg or Harvard, 
is a surprise to most people who 
considered themselves tolerably 
well versed in Japanese affairs. 
The buildings of the Imperial 
University, to be sure, are not equal to the venerable piles 
which lend their ancient charm to an English or German 
University town ; but even in buildings and equipment the 
Imperial University of Japan is not far behind many vener- 

(206) 



A scientist's ambition. 207 

able schools of other lands. But when one comes to examine 
the work in biology, chemistry, the science of engineering, 
and other departments of learning leading to practical re- 
sults, he finds this is not a whit behind the great schools of 
the world. 

In the biological department we saw a graduate student 
famous the world over for his studies of fish parasites. For 
years he has been making microscopic examinations of these 
minute enemies which prey upon the finny tribe, and his re- 
searches have provoked the favorable comment of scientific 
men in all parts of the world. As I approached his labora- 
tory he had just discovered a new parasite, which he showed 
me with considerable satisfaction, imprisoned as it was 
between the glasses of his slide. He expects to devote his 
life to the study of fish parasites, though he is gradually 
coming to the belief that his ambition has taken too wide a 
range, and that he ought to devote himself to the parasites 
of marine fish altogether. 

As he is now a very young man, with doubtless forty or 
fifty years of hard work before him, I should think that he 
might before he dies make considerable progress in the pur- 
suit of his favorite study, if he confines himself to a suffi- 
ciently narrow range. I sincerely hope that my friend of 
the Imperial University will not have the same cause for re- 
gret as the famous Greek student of the dative case, who 
reproached himself on his death-bed that he had taken so 
large a subject and had not devoted himself altogether to 
the dative case of the Greek article. This example does not 
stand alone. In other departments also the same careful 
and highly specialized work is accomplished. 

In the early days the University was manned largely by 
foreign professors, and the chief credit for its establishment 
and progress is due largely to Christian missionaries, as was 



208 EARTHQUAKE PRIVILEGES. 

the case with almost every high grade college in the far 
East. In Japan especial honor is clue to Dr. Verbeck of the 
Dutch Reformed Board, who, in the beginning, more than 
any other man influenced the government in the establish- 
ment and development of the university idea. Of late 
years, however, as in all other departments, the government 
is bringing the Imperial University and all lower schools 
more and more under the control of Japanese teachers. 
"Japan for the Japanese," is the cry of recent days, and 
foreign teachers are largely being discharged and their 
places filled by native Japanese, even in the teaching of the 
English language itself. "While willing to adopt everything 
that they think is best in modern civilization, the Japanese 
are evidently bound to be free from dependence on foreign- 
ers at the earliest possible moment. 

As one walks through the halls, enters the spacious 
library, and views the splendid equipment of the engineering 
department of the university, he stands amazed at the 
modern progress of this ancient nation. There is no phase 
of scientific thought familiar to the Western world which is 
• not almost equally familiar to this Island Empire of the 
Orient. Every latest contrivance, every labor-saving ma- 
chine is examined and appropriated if considered worthy. 
In the Seismological department of the university are prob- 
ably the most accurate and delicate instruments for comput- 
ing the direction and vibration of earthquakes to be found in 
the world. The professor in this department set the delicate 
clock-like machinery in motion for us, thus producing a 
miniature artificial earthquake that we might see how the 
nicely adjusted machines, with their automatic fingers, 
marked the slightest vibration in the earth's crust. Tokio, 
by the way, is a very favorable place for such a department 
of study, for scores of times a year it thrills and quakes with 



THE CROWN OF JAPAN'S CIVILIZATION. 209 

subterranean movements. In fact its earthquake opportu- 
nities are unique and exceptional. 

The contrast between the Chinese and Japanese is dis- 
cerned by no one more plainly than by him who travels 
direct from Canton to Tokio. In the former city is repre- 
sented the old educational system of the Orient, in the 
dreary examination hall, with its eleven hundred cells, empty 
and deserted, except for nine days, in the course of three 
years. The supreme test of scholarship during those nine 
days of examination is, as I have already stated, the ability 
to write an essay on some text of Confucius ; the sole stand- 
ard for civil service promotion, a good literary style, and 
aptness to write some incomprehensible pages upon an un- 
fathomable subject. No languages are studied there, no In- 
ductive Philosophy, no Chemistry, Biology, Geology, Botany, 
no engineering or mining departments, no instruction in 
ship-building or architecture ; but one dreary monotonous 
grind on Confucius and Confucianism. The old sage still 
dominates every man, woman, and child in China, except 
the few who are emancipated by the religion of Christ. 

In Japan how different ! Here are railroads and steam- 
boats, the latest electrical inventions, and most modern theo- 
ries of ship-building and mining, agriculture and the me- 
chanic arts, and the crown of all this modern civilization is 
the Imperial University of Tokio. Here Confucius takes 
the back seat, and Galileo and Francis Bacon, Isaac Newton 
and Herschel, Huxley and Darwin come to the front. 

Perhaps this sudden advance in modern civilization is 
not altogether an unmixed good. Doubtless many evils 
have followed in the train of this nineteenth century civiliz- 
ation which has swept with such a conquering march over 
the empire of Japan. Doubtless there has been much chaff 
mixed with the wheat, and sometimes, in all probability, the 



210 THE FRENCHMAN OF THE OLD WORLD. 

wheat has been thrown away, and the chaff of false phil- 
osophy and materialism retained. ^Nevertheless, the con- 
trast between the thousand-year-old Examination Hall of 
Canton and the Imperial University of Tokio reveals the 
inherent difference between the two great nations of the 
Orient. English-speaking people are too apt to lump 
Orientals together, and to see but little difference between 
the almond-eyed nations of the world. 

An American religious paper once gravely announced 
that " Rev. Mr. So-and-So was about to start as a missionary 
to China and Japan," as though either of these nations were 
not quite enough to tax the powers of the average Ameri- 
can missionary. As a matter of fact, there is far more dif- 
ference between the Chinese and Japanese than between the 
Englishman and Frenchman, or the German and Russian. 

The Japanese is the Frenchman of the Old World, as has 
often been remarked ; volatile, mercurial, easily moved to 
adopt a new plan, but often fickle in his rentention of it, he 
is endowed with the strong points, and doubtless many of 
the weaknesses, of the Celtic nations of Europe. To watch 
the development of this new France in these Eastern seas 
will be a most interesting study for the future ethnologist. 

In one respect, however, Japan is different from France, 
for it possesses no vast capital of overwhelming importance, 
like Paris. If " Paris is France," Tokio, though the most 
important city, is by no means Japan. 

A few days after our arrival in Yokohama Ave took a 
journey into rural Japan. Here in the country districts we 
find the Japanese at home. He has adopted no foreign cos- 
tume, and put on no Parisian airs. He has the telegraph 
and electric light, to be sure, and in many places the rail- 
road train ; but in all essential particulars the Japan of to- 
day is the Japan of a thousand years ago. 



A VILLAGE STREET. 



211 



Let me take you on a walk this bright, crisp December 
morning through a village street in Japan — such a village 
street as I have seen a hundred times during my brief stay 
in that fair land. The village boasts no buildings of archi- 




IN WINTER COSTUME. 



tectural pretentions, unless, perhaps, it contains an old 
palace of Daimio times. Even if it does, the palace is 
probably deserted and falling into ruin, though its massive 
walls, wide water-filled moats, and pagoda-like stories still 
tell of its former magnificence in feudal times. 



212 HOUSEKEEPING MADE EASY. 

As for the rest of the village, the houses generally are 
very humble and unpretentious, usually one-story high, with 
a heavy thatched or tiled roof, and defended from the 
weather b} r thin paper screens. A modern writer has said 
that ." Japanese houses have no walls, no windows, and no 
chimneys." Take away these essentials, and one may well 
ask what would be left but a huge dry-goods box. This, 
however, is somewhat of an exaggeration, for the movable 
rice paper screens answer very well for partition walls, and 
the rice paper screens themselves, though opaque, answer for 
windows, through which a " dim religious light " manages 
to find its way. As for the chimneys, what need is there 
of them when the stoves contain no blaze and no smoke, but 
simply a little handful of coals in the middle of a bed of 
sand % If we get a glimpse into one of the Japanese houses 
we are passing, we shall see very little furniture ; two or 
three warm quilts for each person, a small flat cushion on 
which he may sit, two or three " hibachis " or fire boxes, a 
few little tables not more than six inches high, and some 
lamps, cups, bowls, tubs, and saucepans complete the house- 
hold furniture. One will see no chairs, knives, forks, or 
spoons, no carpets nor rugs, no pictures on the walls. How- 
ever, there are some very good substitutes for all these neces- 
sary articles. The screens are often beautifully painted, and 
scrolls on the walls, changed often, add life and color to the 
room. There are no chairs, to be sure, but what does one 
want of a chair when he can sit on the soles of his feet ? 
And as for knives, forks, and spoons, chopsticks are quite as 
handy when one knows how to use them, and far less trou- 
blesome. "What would not our American housewives, who 
are " cumbered with much serving," and grow prematurely 
old with much dish-washing, give for these neat and inex- 
pensive substitutes for table cutlery ! 



"no charge for showing goods." 215 

"We may not linger too long at the open doorway of this 
Japanese house lest we be deemed impolite even by these 
people, who themselves have more than their fair share of 
"Yankee curiosity," so we will pass on to have a look at 
some of the stores, which are open to the inspection of the 
passer-by. There are no show windows, for the whole store 
is one show window with all its goods on exhibition. Here 
is a bakery, for instance, with many kinds of thin, tempting- 
looking wafers, and much gaudy candy, which one finds, on 
investigation, has for its largest component rice flour with a 
very small modicum of sugar. There are bushel baskets 
full of rolls and little loaves with variegated streaks of green 
and red running through them. If we should go a little 
ways into the country we should find the rice flour mill 
where the chief ingredient of these showy little cakes was 
made. Here, under the same projecting roof, one coolie 
threshes the rice straw over the iron teeth of a primitive flail, 
which looks like a carpenter's wooden horse, while another 
winnows the grain by pouring it over a rude sieve, allowing 
the wind to blow away the chaff, while still another coolie 
grinds the rice in a mill laboriously turned by hand. Next 
to the bakery comes a fruit store, perhaps, where one sees 
tempting piles of "kid glove" oranges, great, luscious, rosy 
persimmons, yellow loquots, and piles of little oranges not 
bigger than the end of one's thumb. 

But my readers will pardon a digression here, for while 
looking at these tempting piles of Japanese fruit, I will 
initiate him into the process of eating a Japanese orange. 
Every nation has its peculiar method of extracting the juices 
of this tempting fruit. Perhaps nations might be classified 
according to their ways of eating oranges. The American, 
at least the hotel-patronizing American, cuts his "Florida" 
in two in the middle, scoops out the rich juice with his 



216 



THE POLITE ART OF ORANGE EATING. 



orange spoon, and accomplishes his task deftly and neatly. 
The Australian cuts into eight sections the product of his 
semi-tropical groves and is thus able to eat his breakfast 
fruit with great expedition. The small bo} r of all nations 
bores a hole in the end of his orange and unceremoniously 
sucks its contents, leaving the fair looking skin dry and 
juiceless. The Japanese orange, however, may be eaten like 
a grape, as it naturally falls apart into a dozen different 




A JAPANESE FRUIT STORE. 



wedge-shaped segments. The expert grasps the thin end of 
the wedge firmly between his thumb and first finger, presses 
the juicy section, held perpendicularly and not horizontally, 
between his teeth, and thus in the twinkling of an eye 
extracts all the sweetness from the skin of one section. 
Thus he treats section after section of his orange, eating 
them as rapidly as so many Hamburg grapes. In fact, an 
expert "orangeman" will make nothing of getting through 



CLOGS AND STRAW SANDALS. 



217 



six specimens of this luscious Japanese fruit while the aver- 
age American is toilsomely digging out the pulp from a 
single native of the orange groves of Florida or California. 
Just beyond the fruit store is a barber shop, for hair cut- 
ting and shaving is a great business in Japan. As in the 
other stores, everything is open to the daylight, there are no 
screens, no windows, no partitions. The shop is simply a 
recess from the sidewalk where the barber and his customer 
are sitting, while other customers are waiting the familiar 
"next." 




JAPANESE UMBRELLA MAKER. 



Then comes a shoe store, perhaps, but we see no " Oxford 
ties" or top boots, "Dongolas" or russet tennis shoes dis- 
played; but instead we see rows upon rows of heavy 
wooden clogs, mud shoes on wooden stilts three or four 
inches high, and long festoons of straw sandals hanging 
from the ceiling. These sandals are nothing but soles, for 
there is no need of an upper to protect the foot, but simply a 
strap passing between the big toe and its next neighbor, by 



218 BY MARKET AND WORKSHOP. 

which the sandal is dexterously held in place. Perhaps the 
shoe dealer also trades in stockings and we find a large 
assortment of curious foot-wear made- of cloth and not knit 
like the stockings of foreigners, but sewed together with 
a compartment especially made for the big toe by itself to 
fit the shoes and sandals already described. Next to the 
shoe store is an umbrella factory, and near by is a vegetable 
market. Here we find a very good supply of the vegetables 
of the season. Sweet potatoes are common and cheap, sold 
not only raw but also at almost every street corner, smoking 
hot from the pot or nicely browned from the brazier. Pars- 
nips and cabbage, onions and celery, spinach and lettuce 
also find a place in these stores. 

Everywhere one sees piles of the succulent "daikon" ; 
along the railroad stations, in the fields, borne upon the stag- 
gering shoulders of men and women, loaded upon bullock 
carts, strung upon great ropes and stretched between trees 
and posts to dry, cut up and spread upon the house roofs for 
desiccation, until one is tempted after all these sights to call 
Japan, not the land of the chrysanthemum, but the country 
of the daikon. Of course, the green grocer whose store we 
are inspecting has a large assortment of this favorite vegeta- 
ble on hand. The daikon is a sort of radish, and is of two 
varieties, one very long, sometimes nearly two feet in length 
and six inches through, while the other specimen looks like a 
turnip of gigantic proportions. How it tastes we shall find 
out when we come to eat our dinner at a Japanese hotel. 

As we pass another open recess in the street we see a 
potter at work with his wheel ; still another alcove shows 
an umbrella-maker ; a third reveals a rake-maker plying his 
task with strips of stiff bamboo for the rakes' teeth, while a 
fourth is busy making the lanterns which form such a pictur- 
esque and striking feature of night life in Japan. 



THE PARADISE OF LEAN POCKETBOOKS. 



219 



Let us stop and make a few purchases as we pass some 
of these odd and tempting stores. Your pockets and mine, 
my reader, are not very large, perhaps, but Japan is the par- 
adise of lean pocketbooks. For instance, we will take home 
to show our friends the foot gear of this interesting people, 
one pair of straw sandals, one of wooden shoes, and still 
another of high clogs for muddy weather, and three pairs of 
stockings to go with our shoes. Our purchases make quite 




IK A JAPANESE BARBER SHOP. 



a formidable looking bundle, and we fear we may not have 
change enough to pay for our curiosities. But we are quite 
relieved to find that all our goods come to only seventeen 
sen, five rin, something less than 12i cents. 

Everywhere in Japan, except on the foreign concessions, 
these cheap prices prevail. For instance, at the railroad sta- 
tion I purchased an earthen teapot, holding at least a quart 
of hot tea and with a cup thrown in, for the extravagant 
price of three sen, or about two cents, United States currency. 



220 A DOZEN ORANGES FOR ONE SEN. 

Desiring to have some unnecessary hirsute appendages 
removed, I was told that the price of hair cutting in the 
Japanese saloon where I proposed to go was two sen, and if 
I wanted to be shaved, I must deplete my pocket book to 
the extent of one sen more, or something like six and one- 
half mills for a clean shave. If, however, I desired the 
barber to come to my house to perform his task, I would be 
obliged to pay him the enormous sum of six sen (United 
States money about four cents) for his extra trouble. 

The jinriksha man will run for a good hour toiling up 
steep hills and over rough roads, and at the end of the five- 
mile journey, with the sweat pouring down his back, will 
bow his most gracious thanks if presented with the value of 
a ten-cent piece. One feels that he is taking advantage of an 
innocent and unsuspecting youth when he first pays such a 
trifling sum for such a large service, but these jinriksha men, 
like their brethren of the horsey fraternity all over the 
world, have their eye teeth cut, and it is more likely that he 
has taken you in to the extent of a few rin, than that he is 
in any way underpaid. 

At one time I handed a railway platform peddler a cop- 
per sen (less than one cent), and with various motions gave 
him to understand I desired the value of the coin in the 
oranges which he held in his tray, whereupon he passed into 
the car window orange after orange until a round dozen lay 
on the seat beside me. Had I been aware that I was 
making so large a purchase I would have invested but half 
the sum at one time. It must be confessed, however, that 
the oranges were not very large, and a hungry little boy by 
my side soon disposed of the whole purchase. 

ISTow, if we have sufficiently explored our village street, 
let us go into a Japanese hotel and have dinner, for sight- 
seeing is hungry work. We will leave our shoes at the door, 



DINNER AT A TOY HOTEL. 221 

for it would be almost profanity to bring our muddy foot- 
wear into this immaculate little toy hotel. 

The floor is covered with soft, heavy matting, as spotless 
as table damask, and three or four hibachis are set around in 
different parts of the room to take the chill from the frosty 
atmosphere, which the paper screens very freely admit. 
But still we are cold, in spite of the few little piles of glow- 
ing charcoal, and our host opens another screen door, show- 
ing his kotatsu, simply a square hole in the middle of the 
room, filled with sand, upon which is a little larger pile of 
glowing charcoal. Over this hole is spread a large, thick 
quilt or "futon" and under this futon we all stick our feet, 
and the genial warmth from the kotatsu being all econo- 
mized, our lower extremities are soon quite warm, while we 
hold our hands over the hibachis, and so are soon glowing* 
with warmth at both extremities, whatever may be true of 
the rest of our bodies. 

While we have been getting warm, dinner has been cook- 
ing, and now a Japanese damsel brings it in on red lacquer 
trays. This solemn proceeding is preceded by a very low 
bow, the waitress falling on her knees and touching the mat- 
ting with her forehead before each one of us. Then she 
presents the dinner tray as though making an offering to the 
gods. 

In the tray is a bowl of steaming rice " without any 

trimmings," as one of our party remarked ; no sugar, salt, or 

condiments of any kind being eaten with the rice, except 

such as we find in the bowl of thin soup accompanying it. 

In this soup is a little wad of boiled spinach, several large 

mushrooms, and a slice of an indescribable mixture made of 

fish and eggs, which is not altogether unpalatable if one has 

courage to investigate it. 

Besides the soup and rice, the tray contains a large cup 
14 



AN EXECRABLE PICKLE. 



of lima beans, hard and unsavory, a saucer of fish with a 
little "soi" by its side, and the inevitable daikon. This 
daikon is not the radish in its first estate, fresh from the 
dewy fields, but a most execrable kind of fermented pickle. 
It looks white and fair enough to tempt the most delicate 
appetite, but its taste wofully belies its toothsome appear- 
ance. Some one has described it as a cross between spoiled 
sauerkraut and decayed Limburger cheese, and perhaps 




THE VILLAINOUS DAIKON. 



there is no better description, on the whole, for this most 
villainous of vegetables. 

However, when the gourmand of our own country eats 
Ms "high game" and "woodcock trail," and rejoices in 
his sauerkraut and Limburger, who shall say the Japa- 
nese partiality for pickled daikon is more absurd than the 
gastronomic whims of the American or European epicure? 
However, the most " difficult " appetite need not go unsatis- 
fied even in a Japanese hotel, for the oranges are delicious, 
and the tea is always hot and good even if minus milk and 
.sugar. 



INTERESTING TO OUTSIDERS. 225 

"While we are eating our dinner in this toy tea-house 
a group of inquiring urchins gathers at the window outside. 
If they are interested in us, we are quite as much interested 
in them, and extract no less fun from the inspection than 
they do themselves. As in most such crowds in every land, 
the "small boy" predominates. Yery often he has a 
smaller boy upon his back, for children are put to work 
early in this land. The little fellow on his brother's back, 
though but a few months old, is quite content with his 
elevated position, and evidently has a mild curiosity in re- 
gard to the foreigners who are making such awkward work 
with their chop-sticks. 

Sometimes the baby has another doll baby on his back, 
and I have actually seen a small doll on the big doll's back, 
the big doll on the small boy's back, and the small boy on 
his big brother's back; four generations, as it were, to- 
gether. 

But curiosity is not confined to the small fry altogether. 
Their fathers and mothers look in upon us with wondering 
eyes ; the street peddler draws near and forgets to hawk his 
wares for a few moments; the sword juggler who per- 
ambulates the street with loud cries and extravagant antics 
for the sake of drawing a crowd to his entertainment, seems 
more interested in these strange people who have descended 
upon his native village than in his own performance. 

By stopping to gaze upon us one curiosity monger at- 
tracts another until the whole doorway is filled, and we 
begin to feel ourselves the observed of all observers. How- 
ever, it is a very good-natured inspection, and as I have said, 
we repay it with interest. For every dirty-faced little street 
gamin, and every scald-headed baby (for many of them, I 
am sorry to say, have some sort of scalp disease), every bare- 
headed, open-eyed bumpkin, every black-toothed married 



226 



BEGGARS AND MOTOR-MEX. 



woman, and every sweet-faced "musmee" (for there are 
many pretty girls among them) is an especial study. 

In this throng at the hotel doorway (if it is proper to 
"vpeak of a doorway when the Avhole side of the house is one 
great doorway) Ave are likely to get a glimpse of a Buddhist 

priest with his queer head- 
gear and closely shaven head. 
Very likely he is a beggar 
priest with a little gong 
which he continually beats, 
^ and a big receptacle for the 
offerings of the faithful. 
Other beggars wear a pecu- 
liar kind of hat like an in- 
verted bushel basket, which 
comes down over the head 
almost to the shoulders. 

We also have among our 
auditors several bare-legged 
jinrikisha men, with their red 
blankets wrapped around 
their shoulders, giving a 
touch of color to the scene, 
and leading one to think for an instant, as he glances out upon 
the crowd, that he is on an Indian reservation in the far 
"West. These jinrikisha men deserve a whole chapter to 
themselves, for they form a very large section of the popu- 
lation, besides furnishing a very important convenience to 
the traveling public. They are the hack men and motor- 
men, the horse-car drivers, and horses and electric motors 
combined, of the far East. The jinrikisha was invented 
twenty-five years ago, by a Baptist missionary, though the 
date and title to the invention is disputed by some. 




.,,\iV*i 



A JAPANESE PEASANT. 



AN EXAGGERATED BABY CARRIAGE. 227 

It seems strange "that this inventive and progressive 
people did not find such an important and convenient means 
of conveyance long before, for horses are almost unknown in 
Japan, except in the army, mules are entirely a minus quan- 
tity, and cows do not afford a very swift or delightful 
means of travel. The roads, moreover, are excellent 
throughout the empire, and are just fitted for these light 
and tiny one-man vehicles. "Within a twelve-month after its 
introduction the jinrikisha had become common in the large 
cities of Japan, and within two years its use became uni- 
versal. After getting along for five thousand years under a 
single dynasty without any such convenient mode of loco- 
motion, the nation was evidently ripe for the introduction 
of this exaggerated baby carriage. As mushrooms spring 
up in a night where the evening before there was no sign of 
a growing fungus, so the jinrikisha has suddenly appeared in 
all parts of Japan, and with it came the jinrikisha-man, who 
is now an institution that could not possibly be dispensed 
with. 

Just as there are cabs and cabs, elegant landaus, and rus- 
tic herdics, brightly-polished hansoms and disreputable four 
wheelers, so there are jinrikishas and jinrikishas. Get into 
one of the better class, with a strong man to pull it and a 
good road to travel over, and one is as comfortable as in an 
easy chair wheeled over a parlor carpet. But get a rattlety- 
bang affair such as one sometimes finds, with a low back 
that cuts the spine in two, rattling wheels and a semi-defunct 
man to pull it, and the sensation of jinrikisha riding is any- 
thing but agreeable. However, most of these men are 
strong, quick, and polite. They will tuck you into their 
little vehicle with the red blanket around your feet, and 
start off as merrily as if going to their own wedding. Espe- 
ciallv when several are hired at the same time for the same 



228 



HILARIOUS JINRIKISHA MEN. 



journey, they seem to take genuine delight in their work. I 
have seen ten of these men, two in a jinrikisha, hired by a 
party of five, when roads were rough and time limited, 
scamper along the road with the utmost glee, as boys just 
let out of school go home for a long holiday. They would 
crack jokes one to another, laugh uproariously, and then 
subside into a steady jog trot and monotonous low chant, 
which, beginning with the head man, would be passed back 




A JINRIKISHA. 



to the next, by him to the next, and so on until the last man 
in the procession took up the strain and passed it forward 
along the line. 

Their endurance is perfectly wonderful. Many a time 
have I seen them trot off, a good hour at a time, up hill and 
down dale, pulling their heavy loads without a single breath- 
ing spell, while at the end of the journey I do not remember 
to have seen one exhausted or " winded.'' How would it do 
for our college athletes to take lessons in training from 
these Japanese jinrikisha men ? A missionary friend of mine 



^ CONVENIENT POSITION FOR THE WAITRESS. 229 

tells me that on one occasion, when pressed for time, his jin- 
rikisha-man made seventy-five miles in one day over a road 
far from the best, and was by no means utterly exhausted at 
the end of the day. On the following day he was quite 
fresh and ready for another long pull. This journey, though 
of course exceptional, is by no means unexampled, while 
forty or fifty miles is not an unusual day's work, and may 
be kept up many days in succession by these hardy little 
runners. 

But our jinrikisha men have quite run away with us from 
that dinner we were describing. By this time we must be 
considered to have finished our Japanese meal, drained the 
last cup of weak tea, and ready to leave mine host. While 
we have been eating, our Japanese waitress, in her spotless 
white stockings, has been sitting in the very middle of the 
table, or rather, of the dining-room floor, which serves as 
our table, so that she may conveniently hand us any edibles 
that may be out of our reach. The vision suggested to my 
readers by this description of a great, strapping, awkward 
Irish Biddy planting herself in the middle of the dining 
table, and passing the viands to the different guests, is su- 
premely ludicrous ; but not in the least incongruous is the 
picture of this delicate and deft Japanese maiden squatting 
on her white soles within the inmost circle of guests, that she 
might hand the desired dishes to any one in need. 

Now we will pay our small reckoning, put on our shoes 
again, make a low salaam to the honorable tavern keeper 
and his wife and all his servants and waitresses, and find our 
way through the dense crowd of curiosity-seekers to the rail- 
way station. 



CHAPTEK XIII. 

OUR EXPERIENCE AT A CEREMONIAL TEA — THE THIRTY- 
THIRD DEGREE OF EXQUISITE POLITENESS — JAPANESE 
SOCIAL LIFE — IN THE EMPEROR'S PALACE. 

A Ceremonial Tea — "Past Masters " of Politeness — The Emperor's De- 
vice — A Dignified Function — A Contest in Politeness — White arid 
Black Charcoal — With Measured Steps and Rhythmic Motion — Build- 
ing the Fire — The Most Solemn Moment — Our Part in the Ceremony 

— No Laughing Matter — Smacking Our Lips — From Tokio to Kioto 

— The Garden of the World — Industrious and Careful Farmers — 
Woman's Rights in Japan — One of Japan's Honored Names — Mis- 
sionary Life in the East — Flippant "Globe-trotters" — Cheating the 
Gods — Stone Children with Red Bibs — Confucius's Chilly Cult — The 
Temple of the Three Thousand Gods — Big Gods and Little Gods — 
Rope Made of Human Hair — How Heavy Timbers were Lifted into 
Place — Curious Sacrifice of Religious Devotees — In the Emperor's 
Palace — Osaka, its Mint, its Castle, and its Fish-Market. 




EFORE we leave the fascinating 
empire of the Mikado we must 
all attend "a Ceremonial Tea." 
It is not the good fortune of every 
traveler in Japan to become ac- 
quainted with this unique national 
custom, but it is well worth the 
time it takes to see the acme of 
etiquette, the thirty-third degree 
of exquisite politeness, formality, 
and ceremony, in which the Jap- 
anese are " Past Masters." Pro- 
fessors of the art of giving ceremonial teas still exist in 
Japan, though I understand the professors and the teas 
themselves are not such e very-day matters as they used to 
be, for most Japanese in these stirring days have not time 

(230) 



0E1GIN OF THE CEREMONIAL TEA. 



231 



to devote the hours and hours necessary to imbibing a cup 
of tea in the most approved and correct manner. 

This custom is said to have been introduced by Hideyoshi, 
the great conqueror of Corea, who, after his armies had re- 
turned triumphant, felt obliged to provide some occupation 
for his soldiers which should take their time and remove 
their thoughts from warlike scenes. So, shrewd man that 
he was, he centered their minds upon pouring and imbib- 
ing the " cup that cheers," feeling sure that any one whose 




DIGNIFIED DAMSELS AT TEA. 



attention was taken up for five hours at a stretch by the 
delicate and intricate ceremonies centering around a tea- 
pot would have no room for bloodthirsty thoughts or over- 
leaping ambitions. 

For three hundred years the Ceremonial Tea has been an 
institution of Japanese life, and ceremonial tea-making is 
taught in the modern schools of the government, as it is 
thought to give dignity and grace and a kind of solemn les- 
son in etiquette to all who study its intricacies. When we 
asked the aged professor who had been a teacher of the art 
all her life, and who poured for us the ceremonial cup, how 



232 PRELIMINARY COURTESIES. 

long it took to become perfect in her profession, she told us - 
that a bright scholar studying one hour a day for three 
years continuously might become fairly proficient ; but she 
emphasized the word "fairly" to show that only a very com- 
parative degree of proficiency was attainable by any such 
short apprenticeship. 

But now for the tea. There were five of us favored with 
the ceremony in the old Daimio city of Okyama. After 
carefully removing our shoes, we stepped reverently upon 
the straw matting of the professor's little toy house, which, 
b} r the way, was a perfect specimen of the average Japanese 
abode. I said stepped, but it would be more proper to say 
kneeled, for we were told that it would be almost profane 
to come into the room in our usual upright position. So we 
left our shoes on the ground below and kneeled up into the 
first floor sitting-room of our hostess' apartments. Here we 
saw a gray-haired old lady awaiting us with sweet serenity 
and great dignity of mien. She also was upon her hands 
and knees, and she bowed very low before us, while her 
pathetic gray hairs swept the matting at our feet. "We were 
not to be outdone in politeness, however, so putting our 
hands before us on the matting, we bowed low until the very 
crowns of our heads rested on the soft matting of the floor. 
After remaining in that position as long as we thought 
strict etiquette required, we rose to our feet, and followed 
our hostess up the steep and narrow stairs to the room above, 
the room sacred to the ceremonial tea. 

In this room a fire Avas glowing in the kotatsu, and the 
steaming earthen jar of hot water looked altogether cheer- 
ful and home-like as it bubbled and simmered above the coals. 

This pre-arrangement, however, was only a concession to 
our "Western spirit of haste, for our ceremonial professor 
had been told we had but one hour at our disposal, and the 



STATELY AND DIGNIFIED CEREMONIES. 23& 

tea must be made and served in that short space of time, or 
not at all. Otherwise, she would have kindled the lire 
before us, and have placed every drop of water in the honor- 
able pot, which is the true and ancient way to prepare for a 
ceremonial tea. 

Motioning us to take our seats upon the mats provided, 
she set about her task in the most serenely grave and digni- 
fied fashion. First she entered the screen door with a little 
bronze dish filled with charcoal, some sticks being painted 
white, while others were left the natural color of the coal. 
When she reached the door she turned around and very 
gravely pulled the door partly to with one hand, transferred 
the charcoal dish to the other hand and pulled the door a 
little farther with the hand thus left free, then changed 
hands once more, and finally shut the door with the hand 
first in use. Then, with six short and measured steps, only 
six and no more, she made her way to the fire-hole in the 
floor. Then turning around, with solemn precision, she 
dropped upon her white stocking soles, and with the utmost 
reverence and care deposited the charcoal in front of her. 
Taking from a large basket by her side a pair of curious 
black tongs, slowly and with the gravest dignity she placed 
two black and two white pieces of charcoal on the glowing 
coals. Then, though there was not a particle of dust to be 
seen, she took two turkey feathers and slowly and with 
rhythmic motions brushed the black polished edge of the 
kotatsu. With a specially dedicated spoon she then took the 
saucer of damp ashes and sprinkled them all about the glow- 
ing coals, that the fire might not spread. As I write this 
description the words naturally used seem to imply some- 
thing of hurry and undignified haste. The very word 
" sprinkle " from its sound seems to imply a hasty and flip- 
pant action, but I beg my readers to understand it was any- 



234 A SOLEMN MOMENT. 

thing but this. Slow and moderate, dignified and rhythmic, 
was every motion of her hand and spoon and tongs, and as 
the damp ashes dropped upon the hot sand they seemed to 
partake of the spirit of the occasion, and to falL in a very 
dignified and methodical manner. Then, with the same slow 
and solemn movement she rose to her feet, and grasping the 
chosen vessel with the utmost tenderness, taking six meas- 
ured steps to the door, no more and no less, she set down the 
bronze dish and opening the door, first with one hand and 
then with the other, and then with the first again, and bow- 
ing her gray hairs to the floor, she glided out into the next 
room. 

In rising from the floor she must get upon her left foot 
first, and it would be an unpardonable breach of etiquette to 
put her right foot forward before the left had preceded it. 

In the same way, with slow and measured half-dozen 
steps, she brought in two cups, and then a slop-bowl, and 
then a little bamboo dipper with which to fill her hot water 
pot, and last of all the sacred lacquer box containing the 
powdered flowers of the tea plant. This was, possibly, the 
most solemn moment of the whole ceremony. Even with 
fifty years' experience our hostess evidently found it difficult 
to live up to her lacquer tea box. Taking from her girdle a 
red silk napkin, she smoothed and folded it with extremest 
care, tenderly and seriously, and then dusted the top of the 
tea box, on which there had been before not the slightest 
suspicion of dust ; then unfolding it again in another peculiar 
manner, which took months of constant practice to learn to 
perfection, she laid the cloth aside. 

Following this came another serious ceremony. Taking 
a, bamboo dipper carefully in both hands, she placed it in 
just the right position on the teacup, the handle resting on 
the floor. Then, with her other hand again grasping the 



NO CAUSE FOR LEVITY. . 235 

handle of the dipper, with dignified reverence she poured 
a small amount of water into the teacup. Into this half 
a teaspoonful of the powdered tea flower was put, and 
stirred in with a long bamboo whisk which looked not unlike 
an egg-beater. 

Then with slow and measured tread she approached the 
first guest in the row, and, sweeping the soft matting with 
her white hair, she placed the cup before the honored guest. 
Do not suppose that anything was done except with the ut- 
most precision and care. It is impossible, since life is short, 
to describe the preciseness, suavity, and dignified solemnity 
with which every movement was performed. Not a smile 
passed over her weather-beaten features. Every act was no 
less serious than a religious rite to her. 

However much cause for levity her guests may have 
found, our hostess herself was evidently performing a duty 
which admitted of no frivolity. Worldly chatter seemed 
out of place. Laughter which came into our hearts died 
away before it rose to the lips; and every smile was 
smoothed out before the dignified procedure of our cere- 
monious host. 

Then came our part, which was, alas ! performed so much 
more awkwardly than hers. A native Japanese lady, how- 
ever, was present to coach us, and under her direction we 
first touched the matting with our foreheads ; then solemnly 
raising the cup, touched it to our brows first and next to our 
lips. We were told it was good form to drain the cup in 
three swallows, drawing in the breath after each swallow 
and smacking the lips loudly to show our appreciation of the 
delicious nectar. After the last swallow a peculiar noise 
must be made by drawing in the breath with the pursed up 
lips; a noise for which I have often heard children reproved 
by their elders when discovered making it at the dinner 



236 THE ORDEAL OVER. 

table. I have forgotten to say, however, that before raising 
the cup to our lips it was necessary to put it in the palm of 
the left hand, while the right lovingly clasped the cup, then 
it must be turned half way around, after which it might be 
slowly raised to the lips. 

After drinking, the outside of the cup must be wiped 
with the thumb, while the inside of the cup must be simi- 
larly wiped with the forefinger. Then it must be turned 
half way round on the palm once more, and reverently set 
•down on the matting. 

In the same way tea was prepared for each one of the 
five guests, every one of whom must go through exactly the 
same motions, or be forever disgraced in the eyes of our 
hostess. 

Then taking up the dipper and ladle, tea caddy, slop 
bowl and cups, fire tongs and bronze charcoal basket, one by 
one, she carried them into the next room, pacing most sol- 
emnly each time over the six steps between the fire hole and 
the door ; opening the door in the same way with both 
hands, and then coming back to say " Adieu " to her guests. 

By this time our hostess had relaxed a little ; a weight 
was evidently off her mind ; she had gone through a severe 
ordeal once more and had acquitted herself most creditably. 
Her teacups had no reason to be ashamed of her, and she 
even smiled a dignified smile, and condescended to chat 
most graciously. We could not, however, remain for any 
gossip, but pressing our crowns to the matting once more, 
with many a bow and genuflection, we backed out of the 
presence of etiquette personified, put on our shoes, bobbed 
through the low Japanese door, and were able to stand erect 
and take a good informal breath of fresh air, thanking God 
that no such thing as ceremonial tea existed in the world 
of nature into which we had emerged. 



INDUSTRIOUS AND HAPPY FARMERS. 



239 



The journey from- Tokio to Kioto, from the modern 
secular capital to the ancient sacred capital of Japan, was a 
most delightful one. Such a panorama of mountain and 
valley, seashore and bluff, beautifully cultivated rice fields 
and garden spots, forests of bamboo, orange groves, and tea 
plantations, mulberry bushes and persimmon orchards, rice 
fields and vegetable gardens, would be hard to find in any 
other section of the globe. England and France with their 
careful culture are not so thoroughly tilled as the arable 

in 




IN A BAMBOO FOREST. 



portions of Japan, and even little Belgium, with its teeming 
population, does not seem as thoroughly subdued as the cul- 
tivated parts of the Mikado's empire. On these little islands, 
only one-ninth part of which has yet been brought under 
cultivation, very much of whose area is bare rock and moun- 
tain crag which can never be tilled, thirty-seven millions of 
people find room for existence. While a few discontented 
peasants in Ireland are always in a state of famine and 
appealing to the sympathy of the civilized world with their 
woes and lamentations, ten times as many contented, indus- 
trious, and happy farmers and trades-people make a living in 
Japan and never send to America doleful tales of want and 
woe. 



240 



JAPANESE VILLAGES. 



By a very careful system of storage of water and irriga- 
tion most of the cultivated regions of Japan are beyond the 
reach of drought, and where the American farmer would 
starve, and the English grumble, and the Irish get up a riot, 
the Japanese farmer will live in comfort and plenty. To 
be sure, his wants are simple, but he is quite able to 
supply those wants. One sees few gaunt, hungry beggars 
in the large cities of Japan, fewer still in the country dis- 
tricts. Beggars there are, to be sure, but most of them are 
fat and rosy, and by no means unhappy looking or lone- 




GATHERING THE TEA CROP. 

some, for usually they resemble the famous family of 
martyrs in having nine small children and one at the breast. 

As one rides along the railway between Tokio and Kioto 
he passes innumerable small villages, all built on the same 
principle. The houses with thatched or tiled roofs, pictur- 
esquely turned up at the end, oftentimes a large Buddhist 
temple, frequently a number of shrines, and a street of 
stores, such as I have described in a previous chapter, make 
up the village. 

In the fields we see women working side by side with 
the men, and often on the streets we see them pulling heavy 
loads of rice or vegetables. But after all their lot is no 



GROVES AND GARDENS. 241 

more unenviable than that of peasant women on the con- 
tinent of Europe, and I am told that these field women, 
though they work hard and apparently toil from morning- 
till night, have far more freedom and influence in their own 
homes than the women of the richer classes, and their lot is 
quite as easy to be borne. 

The fields are small, and divided from one another by 
low embankments with narrow ditches between, but all 
under the most exquisite culture, with furrows straight and 
even, and no inch of soil wasted. The liquid manure stored 
at every field's corner is malodorous, to be sure, but without 
it the Japanese farmers could not exist, and what they can 
endure year in and year out, surely the passing traveler can 
whiff without murmuring. Under almost every green tree 
and clump of bushes stands a Buddhist shrine, while the 
bamboo groves with their straight and slim fish-pole-like 
stems and feathery tops, make pleasant and picturesque 
additions to the landscape. 

Soon after leaving Yokohama by rail, beautiful "Fuji'" 
towers into view, quite as lovely when viewed from the 
shore as from the sea. Symmetrical and lordly beyond all 
description, it must be seen to be appreciated. Neither 
glowing words, nor even the most faithful canvas can do 
justice to it. For many miles it dominates the landscape, 
and it is several hours after it first comes into view before 
we get the last glimpse of this glorious mountain. 

As we approached Kioto the beautiful gardens of azalias,. 
japonicas, and chrysanthemums for which it is noted, be- 
came numerous, and though at the time of our visit they 
were not in their glory, we could get some conception of 
what they must be when every spray is a nodding plume of 
flowers. 

Kioto is noted for its temples, its ancient palace, and to 

15 



242 



KIOTO'S MAGNIFICENT UNIVERSITY. 



all Christian hearts, for its splendid Christian university, the 
Doshisha, If this were the only monument of Christian 
missions in all the world, it would be a satisfactory proof 
that they are not a failure. Here on the soil of Japan, 
reared within a quarter of a century, we find a university of 
which any state in the Union might be justly proud. Here 
rare taught not only the classics and sciences, but philosophy 
of the most pronounced Christian type, theology, and medi- 
cine in connection with a splendidly appointed hospital. 




IN THE LAND OF THE JAPONICA. 



The hundreds of young men who assemble at morning 
prayers would do credit to Dartmouth or Oberlin, and in all 
respects this university not only accomplishes the prime 
■object of its establishment, the formation of Christian char- 
acter, but is fully abreast of the times, and is second in popu- 
larity and influence among the Japanese themselves only to 
the Imperial University of Tokio itself. 

The founding of this school is due very largely to the 
talents and influence of Joseph Neesima, whose name is a 
"household word among Christian people on both sides of the 
Pacific ocean.' His lamented death did not weaken the 



THE INFLUENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN MISSIONARY. 243 

prestige or power of the university, but he finds a worthy 
successor in President Kozaki, the former pastor of a lead- 
ing Congregational church in Tokio. Most of the professors 
in the university are Japanese, though eminent scholars 
from among the missionaries have from the first given to 
the school the best features of an Occidental University. 

Any candid and intelligent traveler, whether a profess- 
edly religious man or not, can but note and give due credit 
to the mighty power which has wrought for the regenera- 
tion and civilization of these Eastern nations. To hear the 
flippant commentaries of the average " globe-trotter," as I 
have before remarked, often makes one's blood boil with in- 
dignation. A man who goes no farther than Yokohama or 
Kobe, who sees the missionaries living in good houses, and 
having servants to wait on them, immediately writes home 
to the papers that the missionaries are living in luxury and 
doing no good, and that their influence is not appreciably 
felt in the empire. Such a man is no more a fit judge of 
that concerning which he writes so fluently than the keeper 
of a Chinese josshouse in San Francisco is fitted to write of 
the influence of the Sunday-School movement, or a citizen of 
the South Sea islands of the spread of temperance sentiment 
in New England. 

More than all other influences together has the Christian 
missionary moulded and directed the new civilization of 
Japan. Commercial treaties could never have wrought the 
change. Open ports for trade in rice, tea, and lacquer ware 
could never have sent the new blood of Western civilization 
bounding through the veins of old Japan. But the mission- 
ary and the Bible, and everything for which the missionary 
and the Bible stand, have in less than a generation accom- 
plished what centuries of mere commercial intercourse with 
other nations could never have brought about. 



244 NOT TRUTH, BUT SENSATIONALISM. 

I have met missionaries of almost every denominational 
board in Japan, and in not a single instance have I found 
them other than devoted, consecrated men and women, who 
have dedicated their lives completely and forever to the lift- 
ing up of this people and the glory of God. I have seen in 
our daily papers strictures and criticisms upon the mission- 
aries which a single half day's investigation would prove 
false. But these flippant penny-a-liners, who write their 
first impressions for the daily papers, never stop to investi- 
gate. The truth is not what they are after, but a sensation, 
and my readers may set down smj such ill-natured remarks 
which they may read in the future about missionaries and 
their work, as the result of ignorance and maliciousness. 

The temples of Kioto are very numerous and exceedingly 
beautiful. Of these perhaps the Kyonizu Sanjusangendo 
and Hongwanji temples are the most famous. 

The Kyonizu temple is built on enormous piles, and on 
one side is raised scores of feet from the ground. It is ap- 
proached by a long flight of stone steps, and as we went up 
the steps we were approached, not only by numerous beg- 
gars, but also by many money changers, who offered to 
change our sens into rins. As a sen is worth less than a 
cent and a rin less than a mill, it is evident that the ostenta- 
tious worshiper who wishes to make his charity rattle loudly 
in the temple treasury, can get a great deal of credit for lib- 
eral gift-giving out of a very few pennies. There are, more- 
over, debased iron coins, a hundred of which equal one sen, 
and these are very popular at the entrance of some temples. 
After all, this is the same principle by which light weight 
and punched and clipped silver coins find then' way into con- 
tribution boxes at home, and I have sometimes heard it 
rumored that buttons in America answer the same purpose, 
as iron rins in Japan ; they make as much noise as gold. 



A FAMOUS TEMPLE. 



245 



As we go up the steps of the Kyonizu temple, we see at 
regular intervals stone lanterns, into Avhich candles are 
thrust to light the pilgrim on his toilsome way, and every 
now and then we pass a medicine god whose features are 
worn smooth by the devout worshipers, who have rubbed 
their hands over the parts of the idol's body in which the 
diseases of their afflicted friends were located, in order that 
they might carry the healing touch home with them. 

E} r e diseases and rheumatism seem to be the prevailing 




ENTRANCE TO NAGATA TEMPLE, KOBE. 



distempers in this part of Japan, for the eyes of some of 
these old gods are completely scratched out, and their knees 
and thighs worn smooth by centuries of ceaseless rubbing. 
Xothing is more pathetic among all the superstitions of 
heathendom than these efforts on behalf of invalid friends, 
so impotent and yet so touching^ showing that whether in 
Christian light or heathen darkness, the heart's affection is 
the same the world over. 

Another most pathetic sight in the Kyonizu temple is the 
corner devoted to images of children. Hundreds and hun- 



246 



SUPERSTITION RATHER THAN DEVOTION. 



dreds of these little stone images are ranged in rows, with 
little red bibs about their necks, votive offerings, we are told, 
to the god of the temple, in behalf of children sick at home. 
The red bibs indicate, if I am not mistaken, that the children 
recovered, and are put on as thank offerings over the little 
stone image when the child gets well. 

These temples and this idol worship, however interesting 
to the casual observer, seem to take very little hold of the 
national life. Little true devotion is apparent in China or 




A JAPANESE IDOL AND TEMPLE. 



Japan, the prevalent skepticism having in many places taken 
the place of the old-time reverence for Buddha and the lesser 
duties. 

The gods seem to be worshiped more often as a matter of 
gain, as a superstitious offering to good luck and prosperity, 
and even while they are worshiped they are laughed at, I 
am told, by the more intelligent Japanese, just as the super- 
stitious Christian will often refuse to eat with twelve others 
at table, will fret if he sees the moon over his left shoulder, 
or breaks a looking-glass, laughing at the same time at his 



A TEMPLE CROWDED WITH GODS. 247 

own superstitious fears. Doubtless, with many people, the' 
worship of these heathen deities is a most serious and heart- 
felt affair, and is to them far more than a superstition to be 
sneered at. Japan is not now a land under the absolute 
dominion of either Shintoism or Buddhism ; the real conflict 
of Christianity is not with the false religions of the East, but; 
the skepticism of the West, not with Confucius and his- 
" chilly cult," but with the infidelity of Paine and Voltaire* 
Rosseau and Renan. 

The Sanjusangendo temple is interesting chiefly because- 
of the great number of deities packed away beneath its. roof ~ 
It is sometimes called the temple of the three thousand gods,. 
at other times of the thirty -three thousand, while it is some- 
times even known as the abode of the three hundred and 
thirty-three thousand, three hundred and thirty-three, all 
depending upon how one counts the gods. 

Inside are long, long rows of large figures, some thousand 
in all, if I counted correctly, each with many hands, and a 
multitude of smaller gods springing from the heads and! 
fingers, while in the center is a huge Buddha with a hundred 
hands each covered with a multitude of smaller deities- 
Counting all the gods, large and small, there are certainly 
over three thousand, and as certainly less than three hundred 
and thirty-three thousand, but what the exact number may- 
be, an arithmetician must decide. 

Back of this temple is an interesting spot where, in the 
early days, the stalwart youth of Japan practiced archery,, 
the great feat being to send an arrow in a horizontal line,, 
without too much elevation, the entire length of the temple 
The whole temple roof and the space under the eaves wer& 
formerly shot thick with arrow heads which had strayed 
from the mark; but these are now mostly removed by relic 
hunters, and we saw but few still sticking in the roof. 



248 



SKILLFUL WOOD CARVERS. 



Perhaps the most interesting temple in Kioto, all things 
considered, is the Hongwangi. It is asserted by some 
recent writers that no new Buddhist temples are being built, 
and that the old ones are tumbling into decay. The Hong- 
wangi temple, however, disputes this assertion, for it is still 
incomplete, and was begun only a few years since. It is 
erected by one of the most liberal sects of the Buddhists, for 
the Buddhists, like the Christians, are divided into many 
sects and parties, which regard each other with far more 




A BUDDHIST SHRINE. 



rancor than Christian denominations ever felt one for 
another. In this new temple are some of the finest speci- 
mens of Japanese wood carving to be found in any part of 
the Empire. Birds and fish and flowers and foliage of 
exquisite workmanship abound, though often hidden under 
the eaves, where they are seen with the utmost difficulty. 

One of the most interesting sights about this temple is 
the great coils of rope, made of human hair, with which the 
heavy beams were hoisted into their places. This hair was 
contributed as the offering 1 of thousands and thousands 



ROPES MADE OF HUMAN HAIR. 



249 



of devoted women and girls, and after being used to hoist 
the beams and rafters into their places is preserved in these 
great coils, six inches through and thousands of feet in 
length, for the veneration of future devotees. The most 
pathetic of these coils were made of gray hair, evidently the 
contribution of old grandams whose faith had survived the 
weary years that had whitened their locks. 




AN INLAND VILLAGE. 



The pillars of this temple are made of the beautiful 
Keyaki wood, the most famous building material in all 
Japan. These pillars are immensely tall and straight, often 
three or four feet in diameter, and beautifully polished. 

There is an interesting history connected with one of the 
most elegant of these pillars. The tree grew in an inland 
village and was the pride and delight of all the villagers. 
The priests wanted it for the new temple, but could not 



250 



A SELF-SACRIFICING DEVOTEE. 



obtain it for love or money, until one devoted Buddhist, for 
the sake of rendering it worthless where it stood, hung him- 
self from its branches, thus making it accursed and at the 
disposal of whoever desired to cut it down. In consequence 
of the self-sacrifice of that devotee the Hongwangi temple 
rejoices to-day in its most beautiful pillar. 

The priests 
have a fashion 
of sayiug that 
these pillars, 
were not hauled 
to the temple, 
but made their 
own way thith- 
e r w a r d , the 
facts being that 
the people of 
one village, in 
their enthusias- 
tic fervor, would 
haul the log to 
the nearest vil- 
lage, they to the 
next, and so on, 
until at last it 
reached Kioto, 
and was estab- 
lished in its place among the stately columns of the 
Hongwangi temple. 

Another of the lions of Kioto is the royal palace, where, 
until twenty -five years ago, for a full millennium abode His. 
Imperial Majesty, the Mikado of Japan. Not that he and 
his ancestors occupied this particular palace, for the build- 




A WAYSIDE SHRINE. 



AN AMUSING NOTICE. 



251 



ings were often destroyed by earthquake and fire, but 
were as often rebuilt in the same fashion as of old ; and 
as one enters he can see to-day how the Mikados lived a 
thousand years ago. 

After having received a special permit, we awaited in 
the cold vestibule the pleasure of our guides, who are never 
in any hurry in Japan to do the honors of their show places. 
While waiting we had ample time to read the notice which 
in English and Japanese confronts every visitor. Here it is : 



VISITORS WHO HAVE BEEN AUTHORIZED TO VISIT THE 
IMPERIAL PALACE MUST BEFORE ENTERING PRESENT AT THE 
ENTRANCE THEIR VISITING CARDS AND REQUEST TO BE CON- 
DUCTED INTO THE PALACE. ALSO SIGN THEIR NAMES, GIVING 
FULL INFORMATION AS TO OFFICIAL AND DIGNITARY TITLES. 
VISITORS ARE NOT ALLOWED TO WEAR BOOTS OR SHOES IN 
THE PALACE. VISITORS SHOULD LEAVE THEIR OVERCOAT, 
MITTEN, STICK, WALKING STICK, CANE, OR WHATEVER THEY 
TAKE WITH THEM EITHER TO THE ATTENDANT OR TO THE 
SERVANT OF THE PALACE BEFORE THEY ENTER THE PALACE." 



Not being encumbered with any '^mitten " we only took 
off our shoes, deposited them at the door, and left our " stick, 
walking-stick, and cane," all combined in one, with the 
attendant, and entered within the Toyal precincts. 

Though one would not wish to miss the sight, I must 
admit there was exceedingly little to see. After living a 
thousand years in such a draughty suite of rooms, I do not 
wonder the Mikados were ready to move to Tokio, though I 
do not know that their present abode is superior to the old 
palace. Cold corridor succeeded cold corridor, and room 
after room, each as bare of furniture as the other; no 
pictures nor bric-a-brac, no cozy homelike fireside, no shelf 
of well-worn books, no rocking-chair for the old grand- 



252 IN A JAPANESE ROYAL PALACE. 

mother, or high-chair for the baby, no bed or lounge or rug 
or hassock to give them a habitable look. Every room and 
hall and corridor is covered with matting of exactly the 
same pattern, in strips exactly three feet wide by exactly six 
feet long, and bound with red or blue braid. To be sure, 
there were finely-painted screens in almost every room, 
which would have been the envy of all connoisseurs in 
Japanese art. In one room, too, was the throne, which was 
a very uncomfortable but highly carved and gilded piece of 
the modern cabinet-maker's art, while before it were three 
low stools on which the maces, wands, and other insignia of 
office were laid. 

In the imperial study were beautiful screens decorated 
on all sides with wild geese in full flight. Whether this 
indicated that the study of Confucius which formerly occu- 
pied the young Mikados in this room was a " wild goose 
chase," or not, I am nol; sure. Very likely, however, the 
young Mikados of old were of the same opinion as Solomon 
and the modern school boy that "much study is a weariness 
unto the flesh." Who can tell how many successive Mikados 
have whiled away the tedious hours by watching the wild 
geese flying about the room on these screens? 

The Emperor's bedroom, like all the other rooms except 
the throne-room, was entirely bare and empty of everything 
that could be called furniture. In one corner was a square, 
six or eight feet across, made of cement, on which dirt was 
sprinkled every morning, so that the Emperor might wor- 
ship the shades of his ancestors on the soil (as his religion 
demanded), without leaving his own bedroom. Thus, even 
before the days of cushioned pews and high-priced choirs, 
was worship made as easy as possible for those who can 
afford it. 

In the great open square, around which the royal rooms 



THE LEGEND OF A CHERRY TREE. 



253 



are built, were some feeble attempts at landscape gardening. 
A little stream and rockery and a few clumps of bamboos 
are maintained there, just as they have been for hundreds of 
years. Near the Emperor's bedroom was a cherry tree, the 
progenitors of which were planted by a great Mikado hun- 
dreds of years ago, and 
when that rotted away 
a plum tree took its 
place; then another 
cherry tree succeeded 
by another plum tree ; 
but always in that par- 
ticular spot there has 
been for ten hundred 
and thirty-two years a 
fruit tree for successive 
Mikados to gaze upon. 
This dynasty of the 
Japanese Mikados is 
the oldest ruling house 
in all the world. For 
twenty-five hundred 
years the same family 
has occupied the^ 
throne. Before Eng- 
land, or France, or Ger- 
many, or Russia were 
so much as dreamed 

of, Japan's Emperor held royal sway. When the Greeks 
were at the height of their power the present reigning fam- 
ily of Japan had begun to bear sway. The present Mikado, 
if I am not mistaken, is the one hundred and twenty-fifth 
who has occupied the throne in direct succession. How 




A JAPANESE FARMER. 



254 TEMPTING THE TOURIST'S PURSE. 

does that strike you, O ye aristocrats, who can trace your 
lineage back at most for a few paltry centuries, or perhaps 
for only a few scores of }^ears? Ye are parvenues, indeed, 
beside the royal family of Japan, even though ye came over 
with William the Conqueror himself. 

Nagoya is a seat of manufacture of much of the finest 
ware exported from Japan, and the beautiful conceits and 
unexpected forms into which cups and teapots, bowls and 
plates are cast, makes them the despair of the connoisseur in 
china. Each new article seems lovelier than the last, and 
tempts the lean purse to open once more, even though the 
vision of a long voyage and imperious Custom House 
officials at the end teach caution and economy. 

The ravages of the great earthquake of 1891 are now 
pretty well repaired, but cracks and huge fissures in mud 
walls, buildings, and even in the ground itself remain to 
show the havoc wrought by the wrestling of the subter- 
ranean demons. 

The most beautiful castle in existence in Japan is found 
in Nagoya. It is used now for barracks for the Imperial 
troops, and is surmounted by two huge golden dolphins 
wmose scales are made of large Japanese golden coins. The 
whole value of the dolphins is not less than $180,000. One 
of them was once on exhibition at a great European ex- 
position. It w T as wrecked and lost on the way home, in the 
Bay of Biscay, and great was the rejoicing on the part of 
all loyal Japanese, when a famous diver fished it from its 
watery bed (for which the dolphin evidently had an affinity), 
and it was perched once more, high and dry, upon the pin- 
nacle of the Nagoya castle. 

In some of these busy towns through which we pass, we 
are very likely to find that some gala day is being cele- 
brated, and that half the inhabitants are gathered in the 



JAPANESE JUGGLERS AND ACROBATS. 



255 



public square to watch the jugglers and acrobats, who, on 
high ladders, balanced in the most ticklish fashion, are 
dancing and turning somersaults and standing on their 
heads and cavorting around generally, yet always landing 
right side up on their feet when the show is over. 

Osaka is famous for its castle, too, and also for its mint, 
an institution carried on upon the most approved modern 
plans, and which turns, out as finely finished and beautiful 
coins as are made by any country in the world. What inter- 
ested me most in Osaka was, perhaps, the fish market. This 




JAPANESE ACROBATS. 

I went to see early in the morning, and if there is any 
variety of the finny tribe which was not on sale in the 
Osaka fish market that morning, I should like to see it. It 
is said that two hundred species of edible fish are found off 
the Japan coast, and not one of them, I am convinced, was 
missing from that Eastern Billingsgate. Blue fish and green 
fish, red fish and yellow fish, and fish combining all the 
colors of the rainbow, long fish and short fish, fat fish and 
lean fish, thin fish and stout fish, abounded in every stall. 
Squids and cuttle fish, devil fish and skates were found, and 
every variety of octopus, especially that with the long, jelly- 



256 IN A JAPANESE FISH MARKET. 

like, cruel tentacles, which, if they get hold of a man under 
water, would evidently hold him fast until the life blood was 
sucked dry. 

Besides these were sculpins and spine fish, eels, big and 
little, sea snails and suckers, and all kinds of heche de mer. 
Dolphins, too, seemed to play a prominent part in this fish 
market, and the great red chunks of meat cut out of them 
and exposed for sale gave the stalls the appearance of a 
butcher's shop where Texas beef was the staple article. It 
was most interesting to watch the way in which the fish 
were auctioned off. The auctioneer will present a tra}^ of 
cuttle fish or squids, for instance, praising them up in true 
auctioneer style, and knock it off to the highest bidder all in 
a quarter of a minute, for he has a hundred trays to dispose 
of, and cannot dwell long on any one lot. His shrill voice, 
added to the shouts of the fishermen and the objurgations of 
the buyers, always inseparable, as it would seem, from Bil- 
lingsgate, whether in Japan or England, made a pandemo- 
nium not soon to be forgotten. 

We take off our hats and make our best salaams to the 
receding shores of these lovely islands which we have so 
much enjoyed visiting. "We can only pray that as Japan 
grows great in material affairs, as it surely will as it adopts 
the civilization of Western nations, it may also adopt the re- 
ligion and the Bible which alone have made those nations 
truly great. 



CHAPTER XIY. 



OUR RETURN TO CHINA— THE SEAMY SIDE OF CHINESE 
LIFE — OPIUM FIENDS AND FAN-TAN GAMBLERS — ODD 
WAYS OF AN ODD PEOPLE — DISPOSAL OF THE DEAD. 

An Obstructing Bar — The Will of Heaven — Almond Eyes and Pigtails 

— Noiseless John — How John Chinaman Treats Americans in Shanghai 

— Colossal Conceit — The Future of the Celestial Empire — Shoes Two 
Cents a Pair — A Chinese Grocery Store — Dried Kidneys and Chickens'" 
Livers — Varnished Pig — Allowable Theft — A Chinese Rice Mill — 
Arrested Development — How Chinese Paper is Made — Rice Paper — 
How it is Produced — Woe-begone, Emaciated Faces — The Seamy Side 
of Chinese Life — " Hitting the Pipe " — Opium Fiends — Fan-tan Gam- 
blers — Intense Excitement — Chinese Music — Unearthly Screeching — 
Prolonged and Awful Caterwauling — Human Beasts of Burden — 
China and Japan Agriculturally Considered — Rotation of Crops — 
Novel Ice Harvesting — Fish Farming — An Odd Way of Fishing — 
A Great Funeral — Funeral Baked Meats — Baby Towers of Shanghai. 

N the day after Christmas, the 
steamer Yokohama Mam which 
bore us from the beautiful shores 
of Japan, steamed up to her 
dock in Shanghai, and we found 
^yy J*** """""111 ourselves once more in China. 

Shanghai is probably the 
greatest commercial port of the 
far East. Yessels bearing the 
flags of every nation discharge 
their cargoes at her warehouse 
doors. At least, they do this 
figuratively speaking, and would be glad to do it literally, 
were it not for the obstructing bar near the mouth of the 
Yang-tse-Kiang river. 

This bar the Chinese government allows to fill up with 
16 (257) 




258 VELVET-FOOTED CHINAMEX. 

silt from the upper river, and never makes any effort to re- 
move it, or to form a new channel, as might easily be done. 

" It is the will of heaven," say these fatalistic Celestials; 
" we will not interfere." 

I strongly suspect, however, that it is the will of the high 
Chinese authorities as well, who are not at all averse to 
keeping the " foreign devils " out of their territory even at 
the expense of ruining their best seaport. 

Be that as it may, the port of Shanghai is already inac- 
cessible to the largest vessels, and even moderate-sized 
steamers sometimes must wait for days before they can cross 
the bar at Woosung, where all the large steamers take on 
and discharge their cargo. 

Shanghai consists of three cities united b} T contiguity 
and commercial interests ; the American and English con- 
cessions which are under one municipal government, the 
French concession which is a municipality by itself, and the 
native city, enclosed by a high wall, into whose narrow 
streets are crowded hundreds of thousands of human beings. 

Do not suppose, however, that English, American, and 
French Shanghai are largely inhabited by Englishmen. 
Americans, and Frenchmen. A few people of these nation- 
alities there are, a few thousands among hundreds of thou- 
sands, but to search for a foreigner even in many parts of 
the foreign concessions, is like looking for the traditional 
needle in the hay-moAV. 

Everywhere are almond eyes and pig-tails ; long, flapping 
blouses, loose, baggy drawers, and thick felt slippers, whose 
wearers seem to steal along like cats, so noiselessly they go. 
Especially is this noticeable to those who come from Japan, 
where the noisy wooden shoes clatter over the hard roads 
and across the asphalt platforms of the railway stations like 
ten thousand castanets, each playing a different tune. 



AN EYE TO BUSINESS. 259 

To be sure, there are some fine foreign business blocks in 
Shanghai, and two or three conspicuous churches ; and the 
bund or water front, with its beautiful botanical garden and 
substantial banks, warehouses, and residences, it would be 
difficult to surpass in any city ; but, after all, the prevailing 
impression of Shanghai is of a huge Chinatown with a small 
admixture of San Francisco. In fact, the tables are quite 
turned on the metropolis of our Pacific coast. Here China 
very evidently bears sway, and the little handful of Ameri- 
cans must say " By your leave." 

However, in spite of the general shabb} T treatment 
accorded to John in the United States, there seems to be no 
antipathy to Americans in Shanghai. The average John 
Chinaman is too shrewd to cut off his nose to spite his face, 
and he knows that the presence of Englishmen, Americans, 
and Frenchmen means trade and commerce, cash for his till, 
jinrikisha money, and small change generally, which other- 
wise he must go without. 

Moreover, so far as Americans go, he knows that while 
lie has ample reason to resent their presence in his native 
land, he has far greater cause to abominate other foreigners 
who have imposed still heavier burdens upon his patient 
shoulders. So, instead of beginning his warfare upon 
brother Jonathan, he will begin with Johnny Bull or 
Johnny Crapaud, as undoubtedly his worst enemies. 

Until within a few vears, Americans have stood highest 
in the estimation of the Chinamen. Of late years, not 
unnaturally, their stock has declined in the Chinese market, 
and now the Germans (perhaps because they have had fewer 
opportunities to abuse China) are the favorite people through- 
out the Celestial Empire. 

What the future of China will be, is yet an unsolved 
mystery. That she should always maintain her stolid indif- 



200 UNRESPONSIVE CHINA. 

ference to Western civilization seems impossible. In spite of 
her impenetrable husk of prejudice and self-satisfied conceit, 
her settled conviction that her ways are the best ways, and 
that no untutored barbarian can teach her an} T thing, it 
seems to me that the rushing, seething, nineteenth century 
life which is continually beating against her shores must 
eventually make an impression. Sooner or later the instincts 
that are being awakened in the breasts of all the rest of 
mankind for a larger, freer, better life will find a response in 
the heart of Chinadom as well. 

But I am convinced that there is only one touch that can 
awaken the unresponsive heart of China, and that is the 
touch of Christ's hand. 

Commerce has been knocking at her doors for nearly a 
thousand years, and has not aroused her from her lethargy. 
Foreign cannon have thundered at the gates of all her chief 
cities and they have not awakened her. Foreign inventions, 
and labor saving contrivances ; railways and steamboats,, 
electric lights and modern conveniences, have been presented 
to her in vain ; and all have failed to shame her out of her 
stolid self-conceit. She has gone back to her wheelbarrow 
and her sedan-chair, her paper lantern and her clumsy junk, 
convinced that " we are the people and wisdom will die with 
us," and that the paltry inventions of " foreign devils " are 
not worth copying. 

"What chance then is there for such a nation except that 
which lies in the arousing of her dormant spiritual energies I 
This is the mission of the missionaries of the Cross. Already 
many of them tell me that they see indications of a " break" in 
this benumbing national self-sufficiency, and when the break 
does come, what a torrent of spiritual activity may we not 
hope to see. To be sure this good day may not come in 
this generation or the next, but some day I believe the holes 



A WALKING SHOE SHOP. 261 

already made in the dike of prejudice will widen until the 
whole nation is flooded with the life-giving waters of the 
Gospel. 

Let us take a walk this brisk December morning through 
the crowded streets of Shanghai. Until the edge of novelty 
is dulled every common shop is filled with marvels. He 
who only looks for the treasures of the Orient in the ex- 
pensive curio stores, which abound at the seaports, will miss 
most of them. To be sure he will there find exquisite 
carved ivory and lacquer ware, marvelously beautiful 
bronzes, figures in wood that are almost beyond price, and 
pieces of china and porcelain of fabulous cost. Nearly all 
these treasures, or their duplicates, he could find in almost 
any large American city. But the treasures we look for are 
found in every common shop and home in China, and really 
represent Oriental life and ways. 

Here, for instance, comes a man bending under the 
weight of two hundred pairs of shoes, made of honest, 
undisguised rice straw ; uppers, soles, shoe-strings and all, of 
braided rice straw. "Wishing to take home a pair as a 
souvenir of the Shanghai shoe dealer, we inquire the price, 
and, after not a little difficulty with his language and he 
with ours, find that his charge is thirty " cash," about two 
American cents per pair. Thinking this is not extravagant 
we purchase a pair, but find out afterwards from our friends 
that we have been sadly overreached, and that his price to a 
Chinaman would not have been over fifteen or twenty cash, 
or a trifle over one cent a pair. 

But here is a store from which, though it is interesting, 
we can take no souvenirs home, for it is a provision store, 
and the greasy, unwholesome looking provender exposed for 
sale would, we fear, turn the stomachs of our more fastidious 
friends. 



262 DRIED KIDNEYS AND VARNISHED PIG. 

In the next store are many festoons of chickens' livers, 
dried and strung like huge ill-shaped beads. Other strings 
of dried kidneys hang from the ceiling, and many long 
rosaries of skinny chickens' legs tied together and hung up 
in loops, like great, uncanny necklaces, dangle from the 
roof. 

In these provision stores are also seen suspended from 
the roof, as our grandmothers suspended dried apples and 
pumpkins, strings of ducks, split open and pressed flat as 
pancakes in the drying process. Here, too, are greasy look- 
ing sausages, each one on a little stick of its own, and near 
the doorway is usually a pig, varnished and roasted whole, 
until he is of a most delicious-looking brown. 

If the porker tastes as he looks, I do not wonder that he 
is a favorite article of consumption among the followers of 
Confucius. The proprietor of the provision store sits in front 
behind a little railed-in desk, and seems in no hurry for cus- 
tomers. In fact, it is quite your own matter whether you 
buy or not, and he often affects supreme indifference as 
though he was beyond the mercenary considerations of trade. 
Before him is an abacus, and great strings of copper cash 
coiled one over the other, — twenty pounds weight or more. 

But do not think that this indifferent shopkeeper is not 
shrewd at a bargain. American though you may be, with 
generations of bargaining blood in your veins, he is a match 
for you. Look out for him if you have any transactions to 
make, for his code of morals does not demand any fine de- 
gree of scrupulosity. He will not cheat you very much, but 
a little sharp practice he will regard quite within the estab- 
lished limits of legitimate trade. In fact, petty peculation is 
such a recognized custom, that if a servant does not steal 
more than a certain per cent, of his master's substance, he 
is never even threatened with the law. 



A NOVEL PLEA. 



263 



I was told that a certain master, new to the country, 
having detected his servant in a small dishonesty, brought 
him before the court. Whereupon the servant admitted his 
guilt but claimed and proved that his peculations had not 
amounted to more than fifteen per cent, of his wages. Upon 
this astounding plea of comparative innocence, the judge 
fully acquitted him without even a reprimand. 




A CHINESE KICE MILL. 



As we continue our walk through Shanghai, we come to 
a miller's establishment next door to our provision dealer. 
Here are a dozen men working in a treadmill, which raises, 
as thev tread their monotonous round, a row of hu^e mal- 
lets. These mallets, poised high in air, descend into a stone 
well, partly filled with unhusked rice or paddy. After being 
pounded by these mallets for a sufficient time, the grain is 
separated from the chaff and is then taken out and winnowed 
by hand. There are other kinds of rice mills, but even the 



264 HOW PAPER IS MADE IN CHINA. 

commonest processes are yet very primitive in this great 
empire of the East. 

All China seems to furnish an example of arrested devel- 
opment. Before any other nation, doubtless, China used 
paper and gunpowder, movable types, and the mariner's 
compass, but she has never improved upon her first rough 
draughts. As she made these articles a thousand years ago 
she makes them now. With most nations a new invention 
of any kind is only a beginning of inventions. A great dis- 
covery in physics or chemistry in other nations only sets 
men's minds on the alert for other discoveries and improve- 
ments in the same line. Outside of China no invention is 
complete at first. The perfect machine is the product of 
many minds and of much experimenting. In the middle 
kingdom, however, a machine once invented is invented for 
all time. No improvements appear, no rivals set their wits 
at work to find a better and cheaper way to produce the 
same result. When once a method is pointed out, it is imi- 
tated by unreasoning generations for countless future years. 

For instance,' a well-informed writer who spent many 
years in China in the consular service of Great Britain, tells 
us of the present-day process of making the ordinary Chi- 
nese paper. " There is an entire absence of machinery," he 
says, " for washing and shredding rags ; there are no troughs 
of pulp, chemicals for bleaching, resin for watering, wire 
molds for receiving, and drums for firming the paper as it 
comes from the pulp troughs. Bamboo stems and paddy 
straw are steeped with lime in deep concrete pits in the open 
air, and allowed to soak for months. When nothing but the 
fibre remains, it is taken out and rolled with a heavy stone 
roller in a stone well until all the lime has been removed. 
A small quantity of the fibre is placed in a stone trough full 
of water and the whole stirred up. A close bamboo mold is 



IN A CHINESE PAPER MILL. 



265 



then passed through the mixed fibre and water, and the film 
which adheres to it emerges as a sheet of paper which is 
stuck up to dry on the Avails of a room kept at a high tem- 
perature. The sheets are afterwards collected and made up 
into bundles for market." 




A CHINESE PAPER MILL. 



Contrast this primitive method of paper making with the 
mills of New England. Yet, in the idea of paper making, 
China had the start of us by a round dozen of centuries. 

The most beautiful paper which I saw in China is the so- 
called rice paper ; a soft, delicate, velvety substance, which 
takes colors to perfection, and which is very much in demand 



266 A CURIOUS PROCESS. 

for the brilliant water-color paintings in which the Chinese 
are so expert. 

I often wondered how this paper was made, so different 
is it from any other similar product I have ever seen, and 
have only just learned that it is not paper at all, but the 
pith of a large-leaved, bush-like plant, which grows luxu- 
riantly in the province of Kuei-chow. My informant was 
invited to visit a worker in pith after night-fall. Although 
somewhat surprised at the hour named he accepted the in- 
vitation. On his arrival he was ushered into a badly lighted 
room where a man was sitting with his tools before him. 
These consisted of a smooth stone about a foot square and 
an inch and a half thick, and a large knife or hatchet with a 
short wooden handle. The blade was about a foot long, 
two inches broad and nearly half an inch thick at the back. 
It was sharp as a razor. Placing a piece of round pith on 
the stone and his left hand on the top, he rolled the pith 
backwards and forwards for a moment until he got it into 
the required position. Then, seizing the knife with his right 
hand, he held the edge of the blade, after a feint or two, 
close to the pith, which he kept rolling to the left with his 
left hand until nothing remained to roll; for the pith had, 
by the application of the knife, been pared into a square, 
white sheet of uniform thickness. 

The process seemed so easy that the visitor determined 
to try it himself, and, posing as a professional worker, he 
succeeded in hacking the pith and in nearly maiming him- 
self for life. He was convinced that a keen eye and a 
steady, experienced hand were needed for the work. For 
this reason these sheets of pith are manufactured only at 
night when the city is asleep and the makers are not liable 
to be disturbed. 

As we make our way through the crowded city we see 



IN AN OPIUM DEN. 



267 



woe-begone, emaciated faces which indicate more surely 
than the red nose of the drunkard, the victim of the opium 
habit. One who has lived any length of time in China can 
tell an " opium fiend " at a glance, and even to the stranger 
the olfactory organs give immediate and conclusive proof of 
one's approach to an opium den. In fact the prevailing 
odor of China, the one that lingers longest in the tourist's, 
memory, is the sickening stench of the opium pipe that 
seems to be wafted along every street and alley and court. 
In the center of a circle of depraved Celestials, swarthy,. 




"hitting the pipe." 

half-naked barbarians, assembled in a filthy den, is a dim oil 
lamp, with a smoky chimney. One of the Chinamen has an 
opium pipe with a very large stem (so large that he has to 
distend his mouth to the widest capacity to take it in) and a 
very small aperture in the bowl. With a long knitting 
needle he takes from a little jar a wad of sticky opium: 
about the size of a pea. This he melts over the flame, and 
then, after rolling it about on the bowl of the pipe for- 
several minutes, he inserts it deftly in the little hole. 

Then he lies down at full length, puts the orifice contain- 
ing the opium over the flame, and for two blissful moments. 



2G8 



OPIUM FIENDS AND FAN-TAN GAMBLERS. 



draws in the smoke, swallowing it and exhaling it through 
the nose. 

Not ^nore than three or at the most four whiffs of smoke 
seem to be contained in the pipe without reloading, but 
when these whiffs have been exhausted the almond eyes 
close with a sleepy animal-like content, the pipe is taken 
by some other "opium fiend," and the same slow process of 




OPIUM FIENDS. 



preparation, followed by the three whiffs of Nirvana, fol- 
lows, and so on around the circle. 

Gambling is another besetting sin of John Chinaman. 
It is a weird and uncanny sight to watch a group of fan-tan 
gamblers in their dark den. Four lanterns containing 
smoky candles, and placed one at each corner of a strip of 
matting, serve to illuminate the scene. Around this are 
huddled a motley crowd of slant-eyed Mongolians, mostly 
possessing only one garment, either a loose shirt or a very 



HOW FAN-TAN IN PLAYED. 269' 

baggy pair of trousers, but very seldom a combination of 
these useful habiliments. Either one or the other is fulL 
dress for a fan-tan gambler. 

The banker's assistant, or whatever he may be called (I 
must confess to a sad lack in the way of fan-tan nomen- 
clature), takes a heaping handful of Chinese pennies called 
cash (little brass pieces with a square hole in the center 
and worth about a tenth of a cent apiece), puts them down 
in the center of the square of matting, and places on top< 
what looks like a big brass paper-weight. 

Then with a sharp-pointed stick he picks the pennies; 
away in little piles of four. Until he takes the brass weight 
off of the central pile any one in the circle is at liberty to 
bet, by putting his on the center, corner, or edge of a square 
of cloth. If there proves to be an even number of fours in 
the pile of pennies, one position wins ; if one, two, or three 
more than an even number of fours, some other position on 
the cloth wins. 

After the weight is removed there is no more betting. 
Then the excitement grows intense. Every squatting figure- 
leans forward breathlessly over the matting. All have eyes, 
only for the counter, who, with his pointed wand, is pulling 
away the little quartettes of cash, slowly and deliberately 
from the big pile. Gradually the pile lessens ; twenty only 
are left, a dozen, eight, four, none, and then it is more than 
likely the banker rakes all the silver and gold of the- 
gamblers into his capacious till. For in fan-tan as in 
gambling of a higher degree, the lambs get fleeced very 
systematically, and are only allowed to win often enough 
to whet their appetite for the fatal table. 

Victims of loathsome skin diseases are frequently met 
with in our walk, and even those who are suffering from a 
mild kind of leprosy, which, however is not considered con- 



'270 



SOME CHINESE PRESCRIPTIONS. 



tagious. Where there is disease to be combattecl there are, of 
course, doctors to ply their remedies ; and, very likely, we 
shall meet more than one of these wise looking disciples of 
■Galen, with finger nails some six or eight inches long — 

most inconvenient digits, one 
would think, with which to 
feel the pulse. 

If we fall sick in China 
may we be spared the added 
torture of a Chinese doctor ! 
Sharks' eyes, powdered chick- 
ens' livers, and the last hairs 
on a rat's tail are some of 
the favorite elements in their 
materia medica, I understand. 
An unearthly screeching 
and unholy sawing away upon 
some dreadful stringed instru- 
ment not far off proclaims that 
some of the Celestials are mu- 
sically inclined; and, sure 
enough, we soon stumble upon 
a group surrounding the min- 
strel, who is playing upon an 
instrument that resembles a double-headed hammer with two 
strings stretched from the head to the handle. 

The head of the hammer is made of parchment, and from 
this undeveloped kind of a fiddle he tortures such awful 
music as was never heard on sea or land. If the instru- 
mental part of the concert is hideous, the vocal accompani- 
ment is still more appalling. It cannot be represented in 
English characters, but a faint attempt is something as 
follows : " Kyii, kyi, kyiii, yi, } r a." Imagine all the tom- 




A LEPER GIKL OF SHANGHAI. 



STREET SCENES IN SHANGHAI. 



271 



cats you ever heard pooling- their issues to make night 
hideous from a neighbor's roof, and } t ou will have some 
idea of the prolonged and awful caterwauling which John 
Chinaman calls "music." 

It is difficult to know when to stop in our walk or in our 
description of it. The streets go on for miles and miles ; one 




A JUVENILE CHINESE ORCHESTRA. 



street succeeds another in interminable succession; fish 
dealers and green grocers ; crockery stores and wood carv- 
ers ; quilt makers (for quilt making is a great industry in 
Shanghai); undertakers, with piles of huge, clumsy coffins 
in their warehouse ; these, to say nothing of restaurants and 
barber shops, and other trades and callings, would fill this 
volume, should I attempt to describe a Chinese street as I 
Jiave seen it. 



272 HUMAN BEASTS OF BURDEN. 

As we are obliged resolutely to turn our faces homeward 
from our walk in the streets when duty calls to other things, 
so I must resolutely turn my attention and yours, dear 
reader, to other things than these very commonplace, but 
very interesting, streets of Shanghai. 

Let us visit the country suburbs of this great city, and 
see what odd sights are visible there. The first cause for 
wonderment is, perhaps, the immense loads which the 
coolies bear. Scores of them are coming to market this 
early morning with a long pole over their shoulders, from 
each end of which is suspended a great basket of produce. 

It is surprising what tremendous loads these human 
beasts of burden can stagger under. Many a time have I 
seen a coolie with a basket of green vegetables holding not 
less than three bushels, or more than an ordinary flour 
barrel, suspended from each end of his shoulder pole. 
Sometimes his basket contains eggs, which are scarcely less 
heavy. Let my readers think of raising two barrels of eggs 
to their shoulders and trotting off with them at a lively 
pace and they will have some idea of the burdens imposed 
on these two-legged horses. 

But the most unpleasant and ubiquitous of all are the 
men carrying liquid manure. Whole processions of these 
human night-carts do we meet with their two odoriferous 
buckets, holding nearly a barrel each, balanced on brawny 
shoulders. We need not complain, however, of the passing 
whiff, if the coolies can spend their lives amid such stenches, 
and we are the less disposed to complain when we remember 
that it is owing to this careful fertilizing and minute cultiva- 
tion of the soil that the hundreds of millions of China are 
kept on the existence side of the starvation point. 

At this time of year (late December) everything in an 
agricultural line is at its worst, and we must make allow- 



CHINESE FARMS AND FARMERS. 27'S 

ances for the bleakness of the season, for there is " an eager 
and a nipping air " in Shanghai as well as in Vermont and 
Michigan at this time of year. The traveler, coming from 
Japan, is struck by the fact that the cultivation of the soil is 
much less careful and systematic in China than in the 
Mikado's empire. In Japan every square inch is utilized, 
the furrows are as straight as mathematical precision can 
make them; every corner and edging is carefully trimmed 
and squared, until the whole country looks like one great, 
carefully-tended, kitchen garden. 

About Shanghai, however, there is more slovenliness 
visible, less care in little things, more ragged edges and 
fewer kitchen-garden effects. Nevertheless, the average 
Chinaman, in spite of the lack of picturesqueness in his 
fields, is a famous farmer, and if Horace Greeley's dictum is 
true, and if that man deserves well of the world who makes 
two blades of grass grow where only one grew before, then 
John Chinaman should have a high meed of praise. 

He has learned to perfection the system of rotation of 
crops, and in many places, as I have before remarked, he 
would be ashamed not to get three if not four crops out of 
the soil every twelve months. Moreover, if he cannot get 
one crop he will take another ; he is not particular so long 
as it brings rice to his chop-sticks. 

Look over yonder this frosty December morning, and 
you will see twenty men wading out into a shallow pond 
which is covered with ice of the thickness of window glass. 
They seem to be whipping the surface of the pond with long- 
bamboo poles and then raking something toward them with 
long bamboo rakes. For a time these strange antics puzzle 
us. The men cannot be fishing, neither can they be thrash 
ing the surface of the pond for fun. Chinamen clo not take 
their sport in any such athletic way. They need all their 

17 



274 THRIFTY JOHN. 

muscle and energy for the stern realities of life, and have no 
superfluous vital energies to expend on out-door games. 

What, then, can they be doing \ A nearer inspection re- 
solves the mystery and shows that they are gathering one of 
their yearly crops — the ice harvest. The ice dealers of the 
Kennebec and the Penobscot would laugh at the very idea of 
such ice. gathering. What ! they would say, store such ten- 
uous coldness as that ! Harvest ice no thicker than your 
finger nail ! You might as well scrape the rime off of the 
window pane for next summer's consumption or brush the 
hoar frost from the grass for use next July. 

But John Chinaman knows what he is about, and, not 
deterred by any contemptuous remarks which his visitors may 
make, he goes right on thrashing the thinly-coated water 
Avith his long bamboos, raking his brittle harvest together, 
and storing it in great straw-thatched ice houses. Then he 
salts it all down, literally, not figuratively, and thus freezes 
it anew into a solid compact mass ; and, though his ice is not 
good for drinking purposes, he has a product that answers 
very well for refrigerating uses, and which lasts far into the 
long hot months of the coming summer. 

But this is only one crop that the thrifty Celestial ob- 
tains from the same patch of soil, for before he flooded it 
with water for his ice crop, he had taken a harvest of rice 
and one of vegetables, and very likely one of fish, from the 
same two-acre field. 

" A fish crop from a temporary pond which only covers 
the soil for a quarter part of the year," you say ; " why, it 
is impossible ! " Not at all, my reader, and this is the way 
it is done. The ova are hatched in a sluggish stream or 
ditch near by, and when the fish have attained an inch or 
two in length, the field is flooded and the small fry are 
turned loose into it to feed as best they may in the sub- 



CANNY FISHERMEN. 275 

merged rice stubble. The fast-growing fish soon attain an 
eatable size (about six inches in length) and the canny China- 
man may then be seen wading into the water which comes 
half-way to his knees, armed with a fish pole and a bottom- 
less bamboo basket with a hole in the top. 

But the fish pole is not for the purpose of catching fish, 
as might naturally be supposed, at least, not in the ordinary 
way., nor is the basket to hold the finny captives, since it is 
open at both ends. But this is the modus operandi. With 
his pole he thrashes the water, and when he sees a sudden 
gleam and something dart into the black mud, he quickly 
caps the spot with his bottomless basket, and putting his 
hand through the hole in the top, he gropes around in the 
mud until he finds the imprisoned fish. This he transfers to 
another basket which is slung on his back, and then goes on 
thrashing the mud and water until he sees once more the 
silver gleam of a fish darting into the mud. 

It will be strange if, on this walk through Shanghai's 
streets and suburbs, we do not see at least one of the sad 
processions which, in every part of the world, tell the old, old 
story of mortality and decay. I saw many of these funeral 
corteges in China, but none that interested me more than 
one I met in Shanghai. 

A wealthy resident had lost his only daughter, and he 
was determined to show her every token of barbaric honor. 
He was evidently intent on having what our Hibernian 
friends would call " an iligint funeral." Long before the 
mourners came out of the house were the preparations begun, 
and bearer after bearer arrived, each bringing some contri- 
bution to the solemn occasion. First came two coolies carry- 
ing the inevitable roast pig, varnished and crisp and brown, 
his ears and tail decorated with red and white and silver em- 
blems. Then came two others bearing a dressed kid, un- 



276 A CHINESE FUNERAL. 

cooked and standing in a most pathetic attitude with, his 
mouth open and head hanging down to his knees. Following 
the bearers of the kid were others carrying little platforms 
covered with rice, vegetables, and sweetmeats, while on the 
sweets were toy butterflies and dragon flies, emblematic of 
the soul which had taken its flight. 

Then other palanquins came upon the scene. In one were 
two huge paper images which were to be burned at the 
grave, and through whose ascending smoke the soul might 
find its way above this sordid, cloudy world. Another palan- 
quin contained the ancestral tablets ; and still another, a 
great string of mock money, made of paper in the form of gold 
and silver ingots for the spirit's use. These, I was told, were 
to be burned to propitiate the gods, and that the deceased 
might have some change for her long journey. At last, after 
much delay, the coffin, preceded by six Buddhist priests in 
flaming yellow robes, was brought out of the house of mourn- 
ing. It was quite different from our coffins or caskets, and 
tapered gradually from the head to the feet, looking not un- 
like the mummy caskets which one sees in the British museum. 
Over the coffin a brilliant canopy in red and gold cloth was 
then raised, and on the canopy a paper stork at least three 
feet in height, was fastened. Usually, a paper cock has this 
post of honor, I am told, but on this occasion it was an unmis- 
takable life-size stork. Then came out the family friends, and 
a truly pitiable sight they presented, for grief is the same in 
all lands. The grotesqueness of the surroundings could not 
altogether disguise the sorrow, though of course, I am not 
prepared to say that the excessive weeping and wailing and 
agonized outcries were all of genuine grief. But who will 
dare say that they were not ! 

The father of the damsel came first, almost bent to the 
ground by his sorrow, while on either side he was supported 



STRANGE FUNERAL CEREMONIES. 277 

by a mute, who was arrayed, like the father, in sackcloth 
and white linen. Then came the mother likewise supported, 
followed by the brothers all bent double with their sorrow, 
groaning and weeping and wringing their hands. Thus the 
pitiful procession moved along, the roast pig and the un- 
cooked kid, the vegetables and the sweetmeats, the paper 
images and the flesh-and-blood mourners, the mock money 
and the narrow house with its lonely occupant, surmounted 
by the many-colored paper stork; all moved slowly on, 
followed by the more distant mourners in jinrikishas. 

How unspeakably sad is such a sight ! Mortality un- 
cheered by any true hope of immortality ! Death irradiated 
by no reasonable assurance of life! The grave with the 
stone still at its dismal entrance, not yet rolled away. 

~Ro wonder, O father and mother, that ye are bowed 
down with grief even to the ground ! No wonder that ye 
weep and wail as those without hope ! 

At the grave the paper images and the mock money are 
burned, and the paper stork reduced to ashes. Some por- 
tions of the food are left at the grave for the dead to feed 
upon, but most of it is eaten by the survivors, who remark 
as they masticate the generous provisions, " How strange it 
is that this pork has no taste ! " " How singular that the 
spirits should have taken all the goodness out of these vege- 
tables ! " " The departed have evidently been helping them- 
selves to these sweets, for there is no taste left in them." 

However, in spite of the assumed tastelessness of the 
funeral baked meats, which is always remarked upon, the 
mourners manage to make a very good meal upon the crisp 
roast pork and toothsome confections. Oftentimes the 
bodies of the dead are kept for months, hermetically sealed, 
in the house of the relatives, and in the neighborhood of 
Shanghai the body is always buried only where the priests 



278 THE BABY TOWERS OF SHANGHAI. 

indicate. There seem to be no cemeteries set apart for the 
dead, but the whole vicinity of Shanghai is one vast grave- 
yard. 

On this walk into the country, which we have been 
taking together this December morning, we have seen scores 
and hundreds of little mounds unmarked except by a slight 
swell in the uneven soil, each of which tells where many 
bodies have been deposited. Scores of coffins, too, are seen, 
either carelessly set down by the roadside, or half buried 
under a few spadesfull of soil in the fields near by. 

But the most pathetic sight in the neighborhood of 
Shanghai is the baby towers, into which are unceremo- 
niously thrust the bodies of children who die before they 
have attained their first birthday. According to the Chinese 
idea they have no souls before they cut their first teeth. It 
matters little, therefore, what becomes of these tiny, soul- 
less waifs, and so they are thrown, almost before the life is 
out of their little bodies, into these dismal, eyeless towers, 
which here and there dot the horizon. When the tower is 
filled to the roof, the little bones are shoveled out as uncere- 
moniously as they were thrown in, and another lot of infant 
bodies fill the horrid cavity. 

What else could be expected with Chinese views of 
infant life? What respect is due a soulless infant? How 
different this treatment from that of Him who took little 
children up in his arms and blessed them, who said : " Suffer 
the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for 
of such is the Kingdom of Heaven." 



CHAPTER XV. 

A JOURNEY THROUGH TROPIC SEAS. 

A Delightful Voyage — Liquid Fire — The Sacred White Ox — The Gharri 
— The " L Road " and the Bullock Bandy — Fan Palms of Singapore — 
A Tree that Casts no Shadow — How the Bandy Driver Stimulates his 
Steeds — An Effective Threat — Chewing a Bullock's Tail to make 
him go — Picturesque Wharf Venders — ;> Papa Dive " — Scrambling for 
Nickels — A Walk in Penang — Mangosteens and Jack-fruit — Assa- 
foetida and Onions — The Indian Juggler — A Man with a Gizzard — 
The Mango Tree Trick and the Girl in the Basket — The Last of the 
Chinaman — Ceylon's Spicy Breezes — The Waggish Captain's Joke — 
The Odors of Colombo — A Horrible Combination — The Catamaran — 
The Two Instincts of the Singhalese — Persistent Shopkeepers — Be- 
sieged by Beggars — Baby Merchants and their Wares — The Cinna- 
mon Gardens — An Ancient Turtle — Brawny Barbarism and Miss 
Nancyism. 




(HE journey from Hong Kong to 
Colombo occupies about thirteen 
days over tropic seas. The first 
few days from Hong Kong, with 
the northwest monsoon blowing- 
half a gale, are apt to be rather 
uncomfortable for lovers of 
terra Jtrmaj but, as we travel 
southward, the weather grows 
gentler, the sea grows smoother, 
and before we reach Singapore 
we vote this journey to be one of 
the most delightful on any ocean. There are usually few 
signs of life at sea, but on this voyage flying fish flit from 
wavelet to wavelet, and at night the phophorescent animal- 
cula turn all the surrounding ocean into waves of liquid fire 

(279) 



2S0 



THE SACRED WHITE OX OF INDIA. 



as our good ship plows its way through this brilliant but 
harmless flame. 

Occasionally a passing steamer causes all the passengers 
to unstrap their field glasses and level them at the distant 
stranger. Occasionally, also, a helpless sailing vessel is seen 
in the distance, in a dead calm, with flapping sails and 
drooping pennant; its crew devoutly wishing, doubtless, for 
the aid of steam, which carries us so swiftly along. 

Singapore, in the Straits Settlements, is the first stopping 
place for steamers bound for India, and here we have our 




SACRED WHITE OXEN. 



introduction to Indian life. Here for the first time we see 
the typical white oxen with humps on their backs, just 
behind their necks, and with gaily painted horns, one red 
and one blue; a sight which becomes very familiar after a 
few days in India, for the ox is not only sacred in this land, 
but is also the indispensable beast of burden. Here, too, we 
are first introduced to the universal Indian vehicle, the 
gharri. 

Nothing is more indicative of the character of a people 
than the vehicles in which they ride. We are tempted to 
perpetrate a second-hand aphorism to the effect that if you 
will show us the carriages in which a people ride we will tell 



A TREE THAT CASTS NO SHADOW. 281 

you the character of the people who ride in them. The " L 
road" and electric street car are as typical of the hurrying, 
impatient American character as the ram-shackle bullock 
bandy is of the careless, easy, happy-go-lucky Hindu of 
Southern India. 

In Japan the universal jinrikisha is always with us at 
every railway station and in almost every country village 
throughout the empire. In Hong Kong the sedan chair 
bears the traveler aloft above the heads of the nocking 
throng. In Shanghai the wheelbarrow, with its large cen- 
tral wheel and its seat on either side for two persons, shows 
the highest aspiration of the average Chinaman, so far as 
locomotion goes. But in Singapore and throughout India, 
the gharri is the common carriage for the better classes. It 
is not a bad one either, for a hot country, with its double 
roof, and latticed, movable, blinds on all sides, which admit 
the air and exclude the sun. It seems to be, on the whole, 
the best public carriage that can be devised. 

In Singapore, however, jinrikishas are also used and are 
most gorgeously painted with huge gold Chinese figures on 
their broad backs. 

The most interesting drive is to the Botanical Gardens, 
which are extensive and well worth visiting, especially for 
their beautiful fan palms, whose leaves radiate from a com- 
mon center, forming a huge representation of our common 
palm-leaf fan, with a great trunk for the handle and the 
branching leaves for the fan. It would take a giant, to 
be sure, to wield such a fan, but the representation is com' 
plete on a colossal scale. 

When these palms are planted at different angles they 
form a very picturesque addition to the landscape of a 
garden. Looked at edgewise the tree is almost as thin as a 
sheet of paper and can hardly cast a shadow in the brightest 



282 



CHEWING A BULLOCK S TAIL. 



sunlight, but looked at from the front or from behind, the 
huge spreading fan presents a perfect shield to all within its- 
shade. 

Here, in Singapore, too, we see the great straw-thatched 
bandy with patient bullocks hitched to it; and in this 
bandy, when gharris were not to be had, we have been more 
than once glad to ride, shielded as we were from the hot 
Indian sun, and getting over the road, not at lightning 




THE BULLOCK CART. 



speed, but at the rate of three or four miles an hour, which 
is very good trotting for these little animals. 

The bandy driver usually stimulates the speed of his- 
bullocks not only by judicious application of a short stick, 
but more often by twisting their tails, in a way that seemed 
to us most cruel and inhuman ; while one driver, who could 
not get sufficient speed out of his bovine steeds, in his de- 
spair actually grasped the tail of one of them in his teeth 
and began to chew it vigorously as "a discourager of hes- 
itancy" on the road. We were obliged more than once 
to threaten our bandy-drivers and " gharriwallahs " with the 
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, unless 
they desisted from their practices. 



AT THE WHARF AT SINGAPORE. 283 

Whether our threats were understood or not, or whether 
"the society with the long name" is known in Singapore I 
am not sure, but in every case our vigorous protest seemed 
to have its desired effect, and the poor animals trotted along 
without so much applied stimulus from the outside. 

But more interesting to us than the busy streets of Singa- 
pore with their squalid inhabitants, or even beautiful botan- 
ical gardens, were the crowds of young adventurers that 
swarmed to the wharf with various wares and temptations 
for our pocketbooks. 

Here were boats loaded with most curious and beautiful 
shells, lovely nautilus shells, huge, flat, pearly mussel shells 
(so thin it seemed impossible for any living animal to find a 
home between the two discs), crinkly, curly, spiral shells of 
every hue and possible curve. From other boats great 
branches of coral, red, white, and pink, tempted the pur- 
chaser. Still other men, with gaudy turbans and brilliant 
cloths round their waists, offered for sale parrots of even 
more gaudy plumage than themselves ; while others came 
down to the wharf with great baskets of delicious pine- 
apples, for the straits are the very home of the " pine," and 
nowhere else is it found of finer flavor or of larger size. 

In the water about the steamer were scores of naked 
boys ready to dive for a piece of money which the amused 
traveler might throw them. Every grown-up stranger to 
them is either " papa " or " mamma," according to the sex of 
the person addressed ; while all European boys are yclept 
" Charlie " by them, however they were christened by their 
parents. So, as we three pilgrims looked over the side of 
the vessel, scores of vigorous voices would cry out, " Papa 
dive," "Papa dive," "Mamma dive," "Mamma dive," 
" Charlie dive," " Charlie dive." This did not mean that 
the pilgrims should take headers into the water, as the im- 



284 A SCRAMBLE UNDER WATER. 

perative mood seemed to indicate, but that these brown- 
skinned natives in the boats would exhibit their powers if 
only the inducement of a five-cent bit was thrown into the 
water. As at Honolulu and other places where we have 
watched the performance, when the little silver piece began 
to nutter down beneath the waves, what a commotion there 
was among the twenty boats ! Twice twenty supple, clean- 
limbed little fellows would jump into the w T ater, their wrig- 
gling toes and the white soles of their feet would appear for 
a moment above the waves, while underneath the disturbed 
waters would prove that they were grabbing and scrambling 
after the silver bit. Soon one brown hand would appear 
above the surface followed by another and another, until 
gradually the whole upper surface was brown with hands 
and heads, and, puffing and blowing, the whole little regiment 
of divers would come bobbing to the top ; the strongest and 
most expert usually having the silver piece safely tucked 
away in his cheek. 

In the meantime, their little dug-out canoes would, very 
likely, float off to quite a distance, some of them would fill 
with water, others would disappear in different directions ; 
but they would soon collect their property, get into their 
several canoes, bale them out with a quick, dexterous motion 
of the foot, which shoveled out sufficient water to keep 
them from sinking, and then their occupants were ready for 
another dive, if " Papa," or " Mamma," or " Charlie " would 
only favor them with a five-cent piece. 

Two days after leaving Singapore we reached Penang, 
and as we looked out of our cabin porthole early in the 
morning, we found our steamer at anchor and surrounded by 
gaily painted sampans ; red and white and blue of the most 
vivid hues were the prevailing colors. 

"Mahommed Baboo" had his name painted in flaring 



A MOST HORRIBLE COMBINATION. 285 

letters on one of these brilliant boats, and for the sake of his 
name, perhaps, more than for any other reason (it sounded 
so distinctly Oriental), we chose his sampan and were rowed 
ashore for the modest sum of five cents each. 

Penang is an uninteresting place, and its few sights 
scarcely pay for the necessary walk in the hot sun. Such 
gorgeous costumes as one here sees, such Oriental disregard 
of any costume at all, would be startling in any other port 
of the world, though here these scanty garments seem by 
no means so inappropriate as in cooler latitudes. 

The fruit stores are filled with strange products which 
look very odd to our unaccustomed eyes. We indulged in 
some of them, and found, that while a few were delicious, 
others required a long course of education in order to appre- 
ciate them. The mangosteen, for instance, a fruit about the 
size of an apple, with a dull, reddish color, is most spicy and 
fragrant and refreshing. One never is obliged to learn to 
like the mangosteen. 

The jack fruit, on the other hand, which our loquacious 
guide persuaded us to buy, asserting that it was most deli- 
cious, proved to be a most horrible combination of bad onions 
and assafcetida. After hanging a specimen of this fruit up 
in our stateroom for an hour of two, the cabin became 
utterly uninhabitable for several hours, until it had been 
fumigated and opened in all directions to the breezes of 
heaven. We are told by old inhabitants of the country, 
however, that our guide was not far wrong, that the jack- 
fruit is really by no means so bad as its odor indicates. 
However, we were satisfied with what one of our senses told 
us concerning it, and we did not attempt to find out whether 
it tasted as badly as it smelled. 

Here in Penang, too, we saw our first Indian juggler. 
He came aboard the ship while she was lying at anchor, and 



286 THE UNCANNY INDIAN JUGGLER. 

performed all his stock of tricks, which are decidedly inter- 
esting when first viewed, but which became somewhat stale 
when, one after another, a dozen jugglers did exactly the 
.same tricks in the same way ; each one talking cheap-jack 
patter to attract or distract the attention of the spectators. 

In spite, however, of the sameness of his tricks, the 
Indian juggler is a very clever fellow. He will cause a little 
pebble to make its way under a brass cup, without hands, 
when he is apparently six feet away, and when the spectator 
is willing to take his oath that the cup is absolutely empty. 
He will pick another pebble out of your shoe or a large stone 
•out of your pocket, though you are very confident you are 
not carrying a small quarry about your person. He will 
show you an innocent little ball of yarn in his hands, as big 
as a large bullet, and after speaking to the ball for a moment, 
it will be transformed into a little paroquet, which opens its 
bill and squeaks and makes a " salaam " at the command of 
its master. 

He will put an egg shell in a little cloth bag, slap the bag 
around in the most vicious manner on the deck, against his 
own shins, or on a projecting spar, will then take the bag- 
in both hands and wring it so vigorously that you are sure 
that not even a fly could live within its folds ; then coolly 
•opening the mouth of the bag, the egg shell, unharmed 
and sound, will roll out upon the deck at your feet. 

He will open his mouth and take out one pebble after 
another, until you are convinced that he has a gizzard like a 
turkey's, and that he keeps a store of stones for digestive 
purposes in his gullet, for they all seem to come up from the 
depths of his throat. One, two, three, four, up to nine of 
these pebbles he will disgorge, and then, with a convulsive 
effort by which he seems to be throwing up his Adam's 
apple itself, will come, one after the other, four large stones 



FOLLOWERS OF THE " BLACK ART. 



287 



as big as hens' eggs, which he will add to the pile of the 
smaller stones at his feet. 

Before your very eyes he will plant a dry, withered 
mango-stone. After pronouncing a few conjurer's incanta- 
tions over this stone, and passing a handkerchief over it, you 
find, to your surprise, that it has sprouted into a little mango 
tree with four tiny leaves. Another incantation and the 
tree has grown into a sizeable bush with three or four 














THE FAMOUS BASKET TRICK. 



branches ; still another spell is pronounced and the bush has 
become a tree, from which he will pluck and hand you a ripe 
and luscious mango, even if it be not in the mango season. 

The "basket trick" is also a favorite with these followers 
of the " black art." A young girl, often a very pretty girl, 
is tied together with long, stout ropes, which seem to be 
knotted most securely. The girl is then crowded into a 
Avicker basket, larger at the bottom but growing smaller 
towards the top, where the hole is just large enough to 



288 THE FAMOUS BASKET TRICK. 

admit her body. Then the conjurer takes an ugly-looking 
sword, which is, however, probably far more harmless than 
it appears, and deliberately jabs right and left, up and down. 
backwards and forwards, into the basket. Through the center 
and out at every side the sword is seen to stick, while one is 
willing to aver, by all that is true, that it is impossible for 
the sword to escape the body of the imprisoned girl. Most 
recklessly the juggler lunges at the basket. For the sake 
of heightening the effect, the girl emits timid little squeals 
once in a while, and sometimes red fluid, that looks like 
blood, pours from the side of the basket. But, a few mo- 
ments after, the girl, who has apparently been stabbed in. a 
hundred places, steps forth from her prison-house smiling, 
unbound, and unharmed. 

Five days from Penang brings us to Colombo, where we 
have our first glimpse of genuine Indian life. Hitherto, the 
ubiquitous Chinaman has been before us everywhere. He 
has monopolized the markets, crowded out the natives, 
trundled the jinrikiska, and cheated us with bare-faced impu- 
dence. But before getting to Colombo he seems to stop 
short, and there Ave see only the natives of the soil. To be 
sure there are many people from the mainland of India, who 
have come to the more fertile island of Ceylon to find work 
when their crops have failed. But the Singhalese and the 
natives of Southern India speak the same language, and 
resemble one another very much in customs and costumes. 

The glorious missionary hymn, which every young Chris- 
tian learns as soon as he knows the Lord's Prayer, has 
thrown a peculiar halo of romance around this beautiful 
island of the coral seas, and more romantic day dreams have 
centred here than upon any other spot on the face of the 
earth. One is quite prepared to detect the " spicy breezes " 
long before he sights the palm-girt shores of Ceylon. 



ceylon's fragrant isle. 289 

A waggish captain of whom we have heard, taking 
advantage of this universal expectation born of the old 
hymn, while the passengers were at "tiffin," smeared the 
rail of the upper deck with oil of cloves and cinnamon. Just 
as the vessel neared the land, the passengers came up from 
their lunch one after another ; the spicy odors were strong 
and pungent, and were cited by the captain as proof positive 
that the breeze was blowing "soft o'er Ceylon's isle." It 
was not till he reached Calcutta that he explained the little 
joke, and dispelled the romantic notions of fair Ceylon. 

One is sure to believe, when he first lands at Colombo, 
that the breezes are anything but spicy, for all sorts of 
odors which make up the usual smells of a large seaport city 
greet one as he steps ashore. Moreover, if one penetrates 
far into the native town, he will be still more convinced that 
there are other odors besides those of clove and cinnamon 
which are wafted abroad in Ceylon. 

As every place has its characteristic vehicle, so every sea- 
port has its characteristic native boat. The slipper boat of 
Canton gives way in Kobe to the larger and clumsier lighter 
of Japan. This in turn is displaced by the gorgeously 
painted sampan of Penang, while in Colombo none of these 
styles of boat building are seen, but a curious double-keeled 
catamaran, with large out-riders, and so narrow that a 
passenger can barely squeeze his two legs between the sides 
of the very rakish-looking little craft. However, the cata- 
maran is by no means so insecure as it appears, but, owing 
to the large out-rider, it is able to brave almost any sea 
in safety. 

The harbor of Colombo, though protected by a long and 

expensive breakwater, is not, by any means, a quiet haven, 

and such boats as these are the only ones, besides the steam 

tugs, that will lie in the turbulent surf that sometimes breaks 
18 



290 THE SWARMING STREETS. 

on the shore. We were seized upon as we stood upon the 
deck of the Malwa by half a score of importunate boatmen, 
and were almost pulled limb from limb in their anxiety to 
secure us for their little craft. At last, asserting our right 
to ownership in our beleaguered persons, we transferred our- 
selves and our baggage to the least importunate of our 
boatmen and were rowed safely to the pier. 

Here, again, the struggle to possess us and our baggage 
was renewed. Bandymen and coolies, hotel runners and 
guides, besiege us from every quarter, jabbering and pulling 
and jostling and pushing, with all the importunate imperti- 
nence of cab drivers at Niagara in the olden time. Again 
we are compelled to assert our claim to our own personality, 
and, after seeing our baggage duly installed in a bullock 
bandy, we walk on behind after the custom of travelers in 
Colombo, until we reached our roomy and comfortable hotel. 

Even the walk to the hotel reveals a conglomerate 
picturesqueness in the swarming streets, which promises well 
for the interest of our stay in Colombo. Here are white- 
turbaned Hindus, with long white cloths over their shoulders 
and round their loins ; Brahmins with little spots of sacred 
yellow ashes on their foreheads ; Sivites with three vertical 
lines, two white and one red, to indicate that they are wor- 
shipers of Siva, the cruel goddess; and many other Hindus 
with different lines and spots of sacred ashes to show the 
particular brand of their heathenism. Here, too, Mahom- 
medans in red fezzes and Parsees in high glazed hats mingle 
with the throng, and here and there a European, shaded by 
an immense pith helmet, which often comes down over his 
features like a mushroom over a diminutive toad. Naked 
children, many of them with beautiful black eyes and be- 
witching curly hair, swarm everywhere. Before they are 
able to speak they learn to hold out their little hands in 



BESIEGED BY BEGGARS. 291 

beggary, for two instincts seem to have been fully developed 
among the inhabitants .of Colombo — the commercial in- 
stinct and the faculty for begging. Beggars swarm every- 
where, with all sorts of claims on human sympathy, revolt- 
ing and disgusting enough oftentimes, thrusting their de- 
formities and loathsome diseases into your very face and 
eyes in order that they might excite your pity. 

Of all traders that I have ever seen, the Colombo shop- 
keeper is most persistent, vivacious, and vigorous. Certain 
lines of business seem to be overstocked in this little city, 
especially the trade in precious stones, — moonstones, sap- 
phires, and rubies. It is safe to say that every second man 
whom we meet on the street has his pocket full of precious 
stones, either real or imitation, most likely the latter, which 
he is bound you should buy, if his eloquent persistency can 
induce you to part with your rupees. From every shop 
door and window comes the beseeching invitation, "Lady 
buy" ; "Master come in" ; " Master look, just look, need not 
buy"; "Do come, master"; " Mamma, please look here." 
Every few steps a proprietor of a jewelry bazaar will rush 
out at you with a handful of moonstones and sapphires, 
which he will insist on your taking. If you assert you have 
no money to spare, he will tell you that he will trust you, 
and that you can take the jewels home with you to America, 
and send him the money when you are convinced of their 
value. Such confiding trust in human nature I have not 
seen elsewhere, and when I asked for the reason of this con- 
fidence in a passing traveler, I was assured that the dealers 
could well afford to take the risk involved in the offer, and 
that, though they occasionally lost their jewels, they made up 
for it amply by the enormous price which they obtained 
from other people for comparatively worthless stones. 

Even the children scarcely out of babyhood acquire the 



292 A MANIA FOR TRADING. 

mania for trading, and they will run by the side of your 
gharri by the half hour with bouquets of bright-colored 
flowers and canes and every imaginable trinket, with which 
they think they can beguile the unwary traveler. If you 
refuse to buy they will throw the bouquet into the carriage 
at you, crying out in their childish treble : " Take it, master, 
it's yours"; "It's a gift, mamma." If, however, you take 
them at their word and actually accept the bouquet as a 
gift, they will follow you weeping and wailing and beseech- 
ing you to pay them for it, and make your life miserable 
until you either throw back the worthless little bunch of 
flowers or give them a half anna as its price. 

The Cinnamon Gardens just outside the busy streets of 
Colombo are by no means as impressive and as beautiful as. 
their romantic name indicates to foreign ears, for the cinna- 
mon bush is rather a scraggy shrub, without any special 
characteristics in outward appearance to distinguish it from 
a hundred other bushes in the jungle. As one crushes the 
leaves in his hands, however, or scrapes the tender bark 
from the branch, the delicious odor of the cassia plant is per- 
ceived, and one is tempted to buy all the gnarled and ugly 
sticks which are for sale, for the sake of the spicy fragrance. 

Here, too, every tropical fruit grows with the utmost 
luxuriance. Unlike Southern India, Ceylon is frequently 
visited by refreshing showers which wash Nature's face and 
keep it always smiling. Long rows of cocoanut, bread-fruit, 
and jack-fruit trees line the country roads, and some mag- 
nificent views tempt one to linger beneath their shade. 

A few miles from Colombo is a fine estate, noted among 
other things for its ancient turtle, which is known to be at 
least 400 years old ; since it has been upon the title deeds of 
that property for that length of time. It lies in a little 
pool of fresh water in a valley near the seashore, and never 



AN ANCIENT AND HONORABLE TURTLE. 293 

attempts to wander away to greener fields and pastures 
new. In the hot weather, however, the pool dries up, and 
then his turtleship every morning marches majestically up 
to the bungalow to have cold water thrown over his parched 
and dusty carapace. When he has been sufficiently re- 
freshed with many buckets of water he goes back to his 
valley again, until he is ready for another refreshing 
shower bath. 

As in other Eastern countries, everything here is done out 
of doors. In Colombo the fruit stores and shoe shops, the 
barber, cabinet makers, and jewelry dealers all do their 
trading and bargaining and mechanical work with as few 
partitions between them and the general public as possible. 

Everywhere we meet semi-naked coolies carrying huge 
baskets of vegetables and other provisions, dry goods and 
hardware, and every article known to commerce, upon their 
stalwart shoulders. Loads which would crush an average 
European to the ground they hoist to their shoulders or lift 
to their heads, and trot off with them as though burdened 
only with a feather duster. 

The Singhalese men wear high tortoise-shell combs, 
which give them a very odd appearance. To see a stalwart, 
muscular man with a little girl's tortoise-shell comb perched 
on the top of his head is a combination of brawny barba- 
rism and Miss Nancy ism, which is very amusing. 

But we have lingered as long as our journey will permit 
amid the soft breezes of Ceylon, and must take the steamer 
across the turbulent strait that separates us from the main- 
land of India. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

IN SOUTHERN INDIA. 

A Journey with a Bad Reputation — Landing at Tuticorin — Railway 
Traveling in India — A New Use for a Dirty Sock — Preparing for Hot 
Weather — House Building in the Tropics — " Give the Sun no Chance " 
— Horses under Pith Hats — Barren India — On the Ragged Edge of 
Famine — Gaunt Starvation — Disputing with the Ants — Buffaloes 
and Long-legged Goats — A Sunset Scene — A Missionary Bungalow — 
A Girls' Boarding School — How They Make up Their Beds — An In- 
ventory of a Maiden's Jewels — A Missionary's Manifold Labors — A 
Picnic in the Jungle — The "Nine Lac Garden" — Serious Duties 
Again — A Bicycle Story — The Good Devil and his Terrible Bell — 
" Tell Me Your Name, Good Devil " — Bound in the Shackles of the 
Caste System — Encouragement for the Future — A Brave Brahmin. 




HE journey from Colombo to Tuti- 
corin has anything but an envia- 
ble reputation, but it is like some 
people whose reputation is worse 
than their actual character, or 
who at least have lucid intervals, 
when their better natures pre- 
vail. We found the short journey 
of a day and a night between 
the two ports very pleasant and 
restful. The British India 
steamer was large and com- 
fortable ; the sea was smooth and smiling ; and even the 
dreaded landing at Tuticorin, which had been pictured to us 
as a most harrowing experience, was by no means as bad as 
we expected. 

( 294 ) 



RAILWAY TRAVEL IN INDIA. 295 

On all this southern coast of India there is not a good 
harbor, and Tuticorin, like the great capital of Madras, is sit- 
uated on the stormy, surf -beaten shore of the open ocean. 

At Tuticorin passengers are taken ashore by a small, 
puffing, bobbing tug-boat, whose gyrations often try even 
the strongest stomach. Calm as was the day on which 
we landed, the little steamer which came to take us off 
jumped and bumped against her larger sister, and threatened 
to tear away the gangwa}^ which had been let down for us 
to descend. However, by skillful manoeuvring, we got away 
from the great ship's side without any serious damage, and, 
in course of time, we landed at the tiny wharf which ran out 
from the shore. 

Tuticorin is a long, low, rambling, native town, contain- 
ing about twenty European inhabitants. It does not invite 
the traveler to linger long in its hot and dusty streets. We 
found our way to the railway station and were soon aboard 
the train for Madura, the largest city of Southern India. 

Railway traveling in Southern India has some peculiari- 
ties which distinguish it from travel in other parts of the 
world. The distances are long, the trains are slow, and 
much of the journey must be done at night, so that every 
first and second-class car has a sleeping compartment. But 
do not imagine for a moment, my reader, that a Pullman or 
Wagner have cast their inventive spell over the Indian rail- 
ways. Far from it, as you will find before you have spent a 
night on one of them. There are two tiers of berths on each 
side of each compartment running lengthwise with the car, 
and sometimes three tiers, and on these narrow shelves one 
must curl up, providing his own blankets and pillows, and 
thus pass as comfortable a night as circumstances will permit. 

Many travelers take their own servants with them, who 
make up their beds and look after their baggage, and even 



29G A NEW WAY TO MAKE COFFEE. 

provide them with lunches from the capacious hampers, 
which are usually taken along on such journeys. A servant 
is not necessary, however, but is often felt to be rather in 
the way by those who are accustomed to wait upon them- 
selves. There are occasional eating houses provided at the 
stations along the route, and any number of coolies may be 
hired at a moment's notice, who, for a quarter of an anna, 
or one cent, will carry your baggage for any reasonable 
distance. 

The ideas of some of these native servants who are picked 
up by the round-the-world traveler, as to the proprieties of 
civilized life, are sometimes startling. To this, that traveler 
will testify who woke up one morning and looked aghast as 
he saw his servant straining his morning coffee through one 
of his socks which had been discarded the night before. 
Springing from his berth the traveler cried out : " What are 
you doing, you rascal, what are you straining that coffee 
through ? " " Oh, master, master," replied the terrified ser- 
vant, " it is not master's clean stocking, it is master's dirty 
stocking. Coolie will not use master's clean stocking for 
coffee." The master, however, was hardly reassured by this 
information, and lost his appetite for his usual morning 
beverage, as can be easily imagined. 

These railway cars, like everything else in India, are built 
for hot weather which, in the southern part of the continent 
at least, prevails for eleven months in the year. So every- 
one prepares for the hot weather, and the people suffer as 
little, I imagine, from the extreme heat as inhabitants of a 
northern clime suffer from extreme cold. The pity that is 
lavished upon dwellers in the tropics on account of the heat 
they endure and on the inhabitants of Arctic regions on 
account of the cold they suffer, is largely misplaced, as these 
inhabitants themselves would assert. 



"GIVE THE SUN NO CHANCE." 29? 

As I said, in India even the railway cars are built for hot 
weather. The double roof keeps the sun from beating 
directly upon the passengers ; the wide, projecting blinds 
ward off his beams from the windows, which are often made 
of smoked glass, the better to protect the traveler ; the seats 
are not upholstered in plush and Avoolen, but in cool leather 
or still cooler straw, and often at the stations water by the 
bucketful is thrown over the top of the cars and allowed to 
trickle down their sides that evaporation may keep the occu- 
pants cooler. 

This regard for the season, too, regulates the building of 
the houses, which for the most part are high-posted dwell- 
ings of one story, with ample verandas, and wide doors 
which are seldom closed, clay or night. A screen with a 
wide space at the top and bottom of the doors affords 
ample privacy, and in every way air is encouraged to circu- 
late above and below, and wherever a breath of wind can be 
prevailed upon to blow. 

The airy costumes of the people emphasize the fact that 
they live in the tropics, while foreigners usually provide 
themselves with .huge pith hats, which, though far from 
cornel) 7 , protect the sensitive skull of the European from the 
burning rays of the sun. 

" Give the sun no chance," is one of the proverbs on 
every person's tongue. If he once shoots his rays upon you, 
so that you are even partly stricken by them, it is very diffi- 
cult ever after to live in India. Even horses in many cities 
are protected by pith helmets. At the best, these poor 
creatures do but little work when compared with their 
Northern brethren. Eight or ten miles a day for a horse, 
unless he be one of the hardy native ponies, is considered a 
sufficient daily task for these tropical latitudes. Men and 
women, too, learn to take life more easily here than in the 



298 ON THE VERGE OF FAMINE. 

North. Early morning tea, often in bed, a late breakfast, 
with a nap in the middle of the day, and dinner towards 
sunset, is the usual routine of family life. Work, both in- 
tellectual and physical, must be done in the cool of the day ; 
exercise must be taken when the sun is sinking below the 
horizon, or not at all. 

Southern India was much more barren and desert-like 
than we had supposed. "India's coral strand" had always 
been pictured to our imagination as clothed in living green 
and begirt with waving palm trees. When we saw it vegeta- 
tion was as withered and much of the land was as parched as 
the desert of Sahara itself. Gaunt, bleak mountains rose in 
the distance, and as we came nearer we could see that they 
were treeless and pastureless ; no gurgling brooks ran down 
their thirsty sides, no growth of spruce and hemlock, pine or 
fir, which make our American hills so beautiful, clothed 
their ragged spurs, but, arid and bare, they stood out in the 
blazing sunlight, the bleached monuments of many cen- 
turies of drought. 

Many dry seasons have succeeded one another in some 
parts of Southern India, and in not a few places the people, 
always on the verge of famine, had crossed the terribly nar- 
row line which separates them from poverty or actual 
starvation. 

In many places in the fields we could see men and 
women digging eagerly for dry roots, which in times when 
the crops fail and dire necessity urges, are used for food, but 
which are, at the best, very coarse and distasteful fare. In 
other places we could see old women crouching over and 
hobbling along the road, picking up, grain hj grain, a few 
scattered kernels of rice which had fallen from the scanty 
sheaves Avhich the men had borne along before them. A 
missionary friend told me that he had more than once seen 



ROBBING THE ANTS OP THEIR STORES. 



299 



the people scratching in the ant-hills for grain hidden by the 
industrious insects for future use, so reduced and poverty- 
stricken are the masses of the people. 

The government had started relief-works in some parts 
of India, anticipating a famine, and the missionaries were 
busy, even in the early spring, in distributing what they 
could afford, to keep their people from actual starvation. 




NATIVES OF SOUTHERN INDIA. 



The price of rice, which in seasons of plenty goes as low as 
sixteen measures to the rupee, now has gone up to five and six 
measures to the rupee, and it can be imagined how little the 
people whose crops have failed get for the few "pice" they 
have at their disposal for their daily rations. Those who 
live in more favored lands, where famine is unknown and 
the rains never fail, can scarcely comprehend what it is to^ 
see the gaunt form of Famine stalking along the highway. 



300 SEEN FROM THE CAR WINDOW. 

Scenes from the car window, however, are not altogether 
sad and gloomy. The railway stations are alive with dusky 
people in many colored garments. Even the dry fields seem 
to afford some nourishment for the hump-backed cows, and 
the smooth-haired, rhinoceros-like buffaloes; while great 
herds of long-legged goats, which appear to be walking on 
stilts, show the sky line plainly beneath their bellies, as one 
looks out upon the fields where they are grazing in every 
direction. 

The goatherds, as in Scripture times, are watching over 
their flocks, and sometimes, as they go on before to better 
pastures, they are followed by long lines of their gaunt 
flocks marching in single file a quarter of a mile long, over 
the dry and dusty fields. 

Here and there we pass tanks and reservoirs of water 
which are not entirely dry. Occasionally we see treadmill 
bullocks, hitched to long ropes by which water is raised 
from the depths below and poured into the open ditches, 
whence it is conveyed to the few rice fields which the inhab- 
itants are still trying to cultivate. 

As the day goes on the evening coolness steals over us, 
and with the setting sun the most delightful period of the 
Indian day approaches. The whole western sky is suffused 
with brilliant light; a delicate pink above shades off into 
vivid crimson and purple near the horizon. Not a particle 
of vapor is in the air, and the clear, transparent slvy above, 
nnflecked with clouds, is made strangely luminous by the 
brilliancy of the departing "King of Day." Lower and 
lower sinks the sun, and the glories above the horizon be- 
come less pronounced but more delicate in their tone, while 
even now is rising the full, silvery moon. At least, on this 
journey to Madura she rose as the sun went down and 
flooded the plains with her mellow light. 



A MISSIONARY S BUNGALOW. 



301 



And now everything is glorified; the squalid hovels of 
the pariahs are touched with silver ; the rugged outlines of 
the hills are softened and mellowed ; the dry and parched 
rice fields, which would bear not even a cupful of precious, 
grain for their cultivators, look, under this silvery radiance,, 
like the favored gardens of the gods, and everything is. 
changed from the harsh brilliance of sunlight to the mellow 
glories of the evening. 

A journey of two hours after sunset brought us to some 




A NATIVE VILLAGE OF SOUTHERN INDIA. 

dear friends in the first missionary bungalow which it was 
our privilege to visit in India. 

Imagine a long, low building with wide verandas, sup- 
ported by large pillars. The out-lying buildings are quite 
impressive, not by reason of their magnificence or architec- 
tural beauty, but because of their extent, for the sleeping 
rooms must be large and airy to be in anywise tolerable in 
the hot season, and the missionary is often expected to enter- 
tain guests, which compels him to have a house of generous 
size. The irreverent globe-trotter who goes home to deride 



302 THE DISPENSARY AND BOARDING SCHOOL. 

missionary life, and to tell about the luxury and extrava- 
gance of missionaries' homes, is frequently very glad to take 
shelter beneath this hospitable roof when he finds himself in 
an Indian city with no other place in which to spend the 
night than the indifferent traveler's bungalow. 

A little away from the first bungalow, into which we 
were introduced to missionary life, stands another house, 
that of the medical missionary. Here, tens of thousands of 
suffering natives every year obtain medicine or surgical 
treatment which restores them to health and strength. 
There is no more powerful auxiliary of missionary effort 
than the surgeon's knife, and the well-stocked dispensary. 
On either side of the central bungalow are the teachers' 
houses, where the unmarried ladies of the mission have their 
abode, and near by is the dormitory for the girls' boarding 
school. We find no dainty, carpeted, and curtained bou- 
doirs such as Vassar, Smith, and Wellesley can boast, but a 
low shed-like building, which affords shelter and the few 
necessary conveniences to the girls who are here obtaining 
an education. 

No four-posted, spring beds, with hair mattresses, are 
required for these damsels, for, if we look closely, we shall 
see the beds for fifty of them rolled up and stuck into a little 
case like an umbrella rack. Each maiden has one mat for 
her bed, and all she has to do when bedtime comes is to 
unroll her mat, spread it on the floor, and go quietly off to 
the Land of Nod. "What a saving, this, of chambermaids 
and household annoyances, to be thus independent of sheets 
and blankets and spring mattresses ! And here are the girls 
themselves in their schoolroom, gathered for evening pray- 
ers, a hundred bright-eyed, earnest, intelligent damsels, 
many of them exceedingly pretty, and showing in their 
faces their capacity for intellectual discipline. To be sure, 



A SCHOOLGIRL S JEWELS. 



303 



their clothes and their ornaments look strange to unaccus- 
tomed eyes. A long piece of brilliant cloth affords ample 
clothing to answer all the demands not only of decency, but 
modesty. The ears of many of them are full of jewels from 
the upper to the lower rim. 

Let us take an inventory of the jewels which bedeck one 
of these little maidens. 

On her wrists are seven bracelets, on each ankle three 
more tinkling silver 
circlets, her nose is 
pierced with rings 
and is glowing with 
sparkling jewels, 
which are probably 
paste, but in any 
event are most pre- 
cious in the eyes of 
this unsophisticated 
damsel, while in her 
ears are no less than 
five rings, some of//' 
them of enormousilj 
size. Some of these 
girls have their ears 
not only pierced, but 

slit open so widely that three or four fingers of one's hand 
might easily be thrust into them, and heavy pewter bangles 
dangle from them, resting oftentimes upon their shoulders. 

The Christian girls, however, eschew these ornaments 
more and more as they are brought under missionary in- 
fluence, and not a few of them have had their ears sewed up 
again, as they have learned to appreciate the barbarity of 
their ornaments. In another part of the mission compound 




JEWELS OP INDIA. 



304 



AN INEXPENSIVE EDUCATION. 



is a row of little cell-like rooms, where the girls retire every 
morning and evening for private devotions, not being able to 
have much privacy in the common sleeping room. Their 
bill-of-fare is not the elaborate menu of a girls' college at 
home, of which the comic papers are so fond of making fun, 
but is a very simple one, consisting largely of rice and grain 
and curry. The girls grind their own grain in primitive 
stone mills, such as were used in Bible times; while the 

curry, which is made 
of various ingredi- 
ents, peppers, saffron, 
cardamon seeds, co- 
coanut, etc., mixed 
lEj together, is rolled un- 
der a heavy stone in 
much the same way, 
and thus prepared for 
HI table use. As can be 
fe. imagined, their sim- 
ple living, which sat- 
' ""' isfies every want and 
is all that they are 
accustomed to, costs 
exceedingly little. 
Twelve dollars a year will support one of these dainty 
maidens, or one of her brothers in the boys' school, in 
another part of this same missionary compound. AVhat do 
you think of that, O students of Yale and Harvard. The 
twelve dollars would be considered by most of you a scanty 
supply for the expenses of one week, to say nothing of the 
other fifty-one in the year. 

About the walls of this mission bungalow lizards are 
crawling, deftly catching the flies and mosquitoes, proving 




GRINDING CURRY. 



BISHOP, PASTOR, TEACHER, PHYSICIAN. 305 

themselves very good insect exterminators. On this account 
they are often welcomed by the inhabitants, and live for 
months and years in the same room without being disturbed. 
Crows, with slate-colored necks, go hopping about every- 
where, so tame and audacious that they will fly into the very 
dining-room and pick the food off of the tables. In the open 
compound the white bullocks, which are used to draw the 
missionaries' bandies, are grazing, and before the door 
beautiful flowers and groups of bright-leaved plants are 
growing. 

Altogether it is a very comfortable and pretty picture 
Avhich the missionary bungalow presents to the visitor's eyes. 
If he stays long enough to get into the missionary spirit he 
will see the vast amount of hard, self-sacrificing work which 
is accomplished every day, — a work which, though its results 
seem small and meagre at times, is laying the foundation for 
a great Christian empire in India, — a work which will bear 
fruit a hundredfold in this world and a thousand times a 
hundredfold in the world to come. 

To attempt to relate the manifold work of the mission- 
ary's most interesting and varied labors would be impossible 
in this connection. He is not the pastor of a single flock, as 
is the minister at home, but rather the bishop of a district 
containing hundreds of thousands, or perhaps millions of 
souls. Under him are catechists, pastors, Bible women, and 
helpers of both sexes ; schools for boys and schools for girls ;. 
relief work for those who are in dire poverty, and hospitals, 
where thousands of out-patients and hundreds of in-patients 
are treated every year. 

But it must not be thought by any of my readers that 
the missionary is so wholly given over to the affairs of the 
other world, that he has no regard for the good things of 
this life. He is not by any means an ascetic if he is a true 

19 



300 PESTS OF THE JUNGLE. 

missionary of Christ, for his Master set him no such ex- 
ample. His mission in part is to live among the people as a 
man among men ; to show them by example what a Chris- 
tian home may be, and to elevate them to his own standard 
as far as he may be able. 

There is much hearty good cheer and fellowship in these 
stations, especially when missionaries come together for the 
annual meeting, from their different fields of labor. It was 
our privilege to be present at some of these annual meetings 
of different missions in India, and to know something of the 
good cheer as well as of the hard work of missionary life. 

A missionary picnic in the jungles of Southern India will 
long live in our memories as a pleasant picture. The jungle 
is not always an impenetrable tangle of tropical shrubs and 
climbing creepers, as perhaps many of my readers imagine, 
but is a common name often given to the forest land of India, 
and is sometimes a delightful place for a holiday excursion, 
as in this case. Though, to be sure, one must keep a bright 
eye out for cobras and other venomous snakes, and he need 
not travel far from any city of Southern India to find the 
dreaded cheetah or panther of the jungle. 

This particular picnic which I have in mind was in the 
"''Nine Lac Garden," as it is called. A "lac" is a hundred 
thousand, and the "Nine Lac Garden" was the garden 
of nine hundred thousand trees, planted by the prince of 
Arcot many years ago. The reckless prince squandered his 
patrimony, and lost the Nine Lac Garden with the rest 
of his property, and now all his nine hundred thousand 
cocoanut trees and palmyra palms, mangoes, tamarinds, and 
guavas, have passed into the hands of aliens. It still affords, 
however, as delightful a place as ever for a summer holiday. 

Here, under the spreading banyan trees, were laid the 
snowy white tablecloths, while the bachelor missionaries, by 



PICNICKING IN INDIA. 307 

whom the picnic was given, exercised their skill in providing 
many toothsome dishes; ending the entertainment with a 
grand surprise, which was no other than some bricks of ice 
cream from Madras. To be eating various kinds of ice 
cream on a hot February day in the jungle of Southern 
India, did not at all correspond with our preconceived ideas 
of life in the forests of India, but railways and express 
messengers and telegraphic communication have made it 
possible to have all the necessities and many of the luxuries 
of civilized life in regions where a few years ago they were 
unheard of. After an hour or two of hearty good cheer, we 
took our places in our gharris once more, and were driven 
back to one of the serious duties of missionary life — a meet- 
ing for the educated Hindus, in a village near by. Thus 
the day was ended as it had begun, and was continued in 
earnest effort for the people round about, as every day is 
spent by our missionary friends. The picnic was an episode 
and breathing spell, as necessary and deserved as a parson's 
holiday at home, or a student's outing after a long term of 
study. 

Thus we rode back to meetings and services with which 
all our days in India were filled; some in open carriages, 
some in bullock bandies, and some of the missionaries on 
their favorite steed, the bicycle. 

Many amusing stories are told of the effect upon cred- 
ulous natives of the first appearance of a missionary upon 
his wheel. 

As one of the missionaries was riding along at night 
on his high wheel, he met a Hindu, who, in the gloom 
of the evening, could see only his high-perched form sup- 
ported, apparently, by nothing, moving at a tremendous 
pace over the macadamized road. As the missionary ap- 
proached he rang his bell that the Hindu might get out of 



308 AN AMUSING STORY. 

the way. This completely paralyzed the poor fellow, and 
falling upon his knees he cried out : " Oh ! good devil, good 
devil, tell me your name, tell me your name, good devil. 
Oh ! Oh ! ! Oh ! ! ! I never did you any harm, good devil. 
Go away, go away ! Oh ! Oh ! ! Oh ! ! ! " Then he began to 
scream and run, and just kept ahead of the wheel in what 
seemed to him its demoniacal course. Seeing that he could 
not gain on the "good devil," and hearing the terrible bell 
sounding in his ears and proclaiming his destruction, as it 
doubtless did to his excited imagination, he broke inconti- 
nently across the fields and ran with all his might to the 
"nearest village, to tell how he had been chased by an evil 
spirit, who was sounding the very tomtom of Hades in his 
ears. No wonder that such a sight thus affected his un- 
tutored imagination. 

The morning of the day on which we enjoyed this unique 
picnic in the Indian jungle had been spent in visiting mission- 
ary schools, dispensaries, hospitals, "and evangelistic work. 
And the evening concluded, as I have said, with a meeting 
of educated Hindus. 

This movement among the educated classes of India is 
most interesting and hopeful. Though few of the higher 
castes are as yet directly connected with the Christian 
church, the leaven of the Gospel is evidently working among 
them. For the most part they are very friendly to the mis- 
sionaries, and open to their influence in social and educa- 
tional matters, while in efforts for the temperance cause, the 
Brahmins, who by religion and heritage are strict teetotalers, 
work together with the missionaries for the uplifting of their 
fellow men. 

In some places the missionaries have established lyceums 
and debating societies, and in connection with these, high 
caste people are brought, to some extent at least, under 



A DARING BRAHMIN. 309 

the influence of the Gospel of Christ. As yet the great 
masses of Hindus are bound hand and foot by the fetters 
of their caste system, which is more inexorable than any 
other social system that ever existed, probably, in the 
history of the world. But it is interesting to notice that 
these shackles are giving way. 

In one of the villages of Southern India, a Brahmin, who 
had become convinced of the degrading and benumbing 
influences of his people's prejudices, recently advertised pub- 
licly in the papers, that he would accept the invitation of 
any cleanly vegetarian of a lower caste who should invite 
him to dine with him. This was a challenge thrown in the 
very teeth of public opinion. Not long after it was accepted, 
and a low-class Hindu gave an invitation to the Brah- 
min to dine with him at his house in Madras. True to his 
word the Brahmin accepted the invitation, and on his next 
visit to Madras, where his profession as a lawyer frequently 
called him, he dined with this man of lower caste, not 
secretly, but in the most public way, giving notice in the 
papers that he would do so, and inviting other Brahmins to 
see that he dared to resist the crushing force of public 
opinion. 

Of course, he was read out of their synagogues, his wife 
and all his family connections left him, as he knew they 
would; even his cook refused longer to prepare his food. 
For two weeks he was actually obliged to live on milk and 
plantains, which require no cooking. 

But his courageous example is infectious, and two other 
brave Brahmins in his native city have given notice that they 
are willing to dine with him whenever he returns to his 
home, though they know it means to them loss of caste, 
social ostracism, and. public disgrace in the eyes of all their 
old companions. It means that their wives will leave them, 



310 



THE BATTLE AGAINST CASTE BEGUN. 



their cooks will desert them, and they will be practically 
outcast wanderers on the face of the earth. Nevertheless, 
there are some of these men who are willing to endure 
this obloquy for the sake of freeing their nation from the 
galling chains which enslave her. 

In one of these public meetings for educated Hindus of 
which I have spoken, I have heard a Brahmin denounce the 
caste system with all the fire and fervency and elevation of 
sentiment that a devout Christian missionary could use. 

The same man, Nayna Sastri, a lawyer of Cuddapa, who 
risked his all in dining with a lower caste family, has since 
issued several Social Keform pamphlets, which are well 
worth perusal by Englishmen and Hindus alike, for the 
sake of the high moral sentiments which they inculcate. 

All honor to such brave men wherever we find them. 
The martyr spirit is not yet dead in the world. There are 
some among the Brahmins who will not bow the knee to 
the Baal of caste. Thank God for the courageous and heroic 
spirits of India. May their number multiply. 



-2.&J, 



MM": 



■■■■*■ -vii^^^f^r 



CHAPTER XVII. 



FAMOUS CITIES OF SOUTHERN INDIA. 

Fascinating Land — Gorgeous Heathenism — Tattoo Marks and Sacred 
Ashes — A Man of the Thief Caste — A Robber Village — Calling the 
Roll of Thieves — The Thief Middleman — The Women at the Well — 
The Greasy Fakir — Paying Him for Drifting to Leeward — Blood- 
curdling Announcements — A magnificent Temple — Twenty-five Mill- 
ions of Dollars — Dusty Gods and Goddesses — The Holy of Holies — A 
Stone Bull in a Stone Bath Tub — The God's Bath — A Beautiful Pal- 
ace — The Temple of Tanjore — Filthy Water as a Purifier of Sins — 
The Last Rajah and His Wives — A Wedding Procession — The Kick- 
ing Capacities of an Old Smooth-Bore — Vellore and its Temple — Sus- 
pense and Terror — A Brave Rescue — The Gallant Horses — Tippoo> 
Sahib's Relatives — The Madras Hunt — The Punkah Wallah. 




IVE1ST the most vigorous traveler 
would find it difficult to explore 
every interesting city of this mar- 
velously fascinating land of India. 
I must be content to take my 
readers to a few of the places 
which have most interested me. 
Not always are they the "show 
places " of India, or those over 
which the traveler always goes 
into raptures ; these places you 
will find described in scores of 
books of travel, and I may well leave them to those who are 
most impressed by their wonders and beauties, while I de- 
scribe those which have most strongly appealed to me. 

The city of Madura, to my mind, is one of the most inter- 

( 311 ) 



312 THE SIGN UPON THE FOREHEAD. 

esting cities in all India. Here we find the people in all the 
gorgeousness of their native costumes, splendidly bejeweled, 
and bedecked, and becrimsoned with the gay cloths which 
they wear in most picturesque fashion. Here, too, the deg- 
radation of heathen worship is seen as perhaps nowhere else 
in India. 

In the North, Brahminism seems to be a more refined 
and occult religion than in the South. In the South the 
religious doctrines appeal to the senses, and the magnificent 
temples and innumerable gods which are everywhere wor- 
shiped, tell of centuries of idolatry and superstition. 

As one walks along the street, he is struck not only by 
the costumes, but by the tattoo marks and by the signs on 
the foreheads of the people whom he meets, which tell of 
the god they worship and of the caste to which they belong. 
Each morning they smear their foreheads with sacred ashes 
in red or white or blue, and sometimes with a combination 
of all the colors. Many wear a single spot just above the 
bridge of the nose. Others bedeck themselves with three 
lines running from their eyebrows to their hair, while the 
foreheads of others are decorated transversely from temple 
to temple with the sacred ashes mingled with oil. One who 
has lived long in the country and has become expert in the 
signs on the forehead, can tell at a glance to what great 
caste each man belongs, though it is impossible to distinguish 
the minor castes, as they are almost numberless. 

As I was sitting in a mission bungalow one day, a bright, 
Intelligent Hindu entered the door, and spoke to the mis- 
sionary in charge in regard to some church work which had 
been committed to him. As he went out, my friend said to 
me, " That man belongs to the thief caste." I was quite sur- 
prised at this piece of information, for the man appeared to 
_me to be a very respectable citizen, and he was clad in 



A CONVERTED THIEF. 313 

snow-white cloth, and spotless turban. Instead of playing 
the thief on this occasion he made me a most respectful 
"" salaam," as he came into the room, laying the flat of his 
hand against his forehead, and then very courteously stated 
his business, not attempting to deprive me or my friend of 
any of our possessions. 

Before he departed he placed a little lime, the symbol of 
friendship and good will, in the palm of my hand and then re- 
spectfully retired. " That man belongs to the robber caste," 
said my friend. " What do you mean by that ? " I asked. 
•" Just what I say," he replied. " He is a Christian man 
now, and since his conversion he has had nothing of the thief 
in his nature, having put aside the ' works of darkness.' 
But it is none the less true that he belongs to the thief caste 
and lives in the village where all the inhabitants belong to 
the same caste. Some years since we established a mission 
for them in that village, a number have left their thieving 
practices, but the great majority of the inhabitants still con- 
tinue in their former evil ways. The reputation of this vil- 
lage is so bad, that every night at midnight the police call 
the roll of every adult male citizen, and every man of them 
must answer to his name at the roll call, and show that he 
is in his own proper habitation at the hour of midnight. 
But they are wily fellows," continued my friend, " and as 
soon as the police inspection is over and they have answered 
to their names, they are off on their marauding expeditions 
once more." 

" Nearly every native house in Madura pays tribute to 
this caste," he went on to say. " They go around at stated 
intervals, demanding a rupee or some small piece of money. 
If the tax is not paid by the household on whom the demand 
is made, soon it is found that a cow is missing, or a bullock 
is hamstrung, or that in some way their property has suf- 



314 PAYING TRIBUTE TO ROBBERS. 

fered damage." " But why do they not apply to the police ? " 
I asked. " Oh ! " said my friend, " the police are oftentimes 
corrupt and in league with the robbers themselves, and it is 
more trouble and annoyance to seek the aid of the police, or 
to go to law about their loss, than it is to pay the small trib- 
ute demanded by the thieves. When anything is missing, 
the natives go to the middlemen who abound in these vil- 
lages of the thief caste, and for one-third of the actual price of 
the missing article they buy it back. For instance, if a cow 
valued at thirty rupees is stolen, the owner knows that ten 
rupees ransom money paid to the middleman will secure 
the cow. To apply to the police and go through the tedious 
operations of law in getting back their property, would cost 
so much more, that the middleman's services are usually 
employed, demoralizing as the effect must be upon the peo- 
ple who are subject to such extortions." 

One of the characteristic sights of Madura, as of all other 
cities of Southern India, is that of the women at the well 
with bright brass water jars, which they are filling at the 
public fountain, and which they then carry home on their 
heads or in a basket of braided rope. 

How often this scene has reminded us of our Master's 
conversation with the woman of Samaria as he met her 
drawing water for her family needs, in just the same way so 
many hundreds of years ago. 

Another common sight is that of the religious mendicants 
or fakirs, who adopt every conceivable method of attracting 
attention. 

Here is one with long hair, whose greasy, dirty ringlets 
reach to his very toes. Another with filthy, matted hair 
thrusts himself upon you hoping that his very offensiveness 
will lead you to buy him off and pay him for getting well to 
the leeward. 



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SNAKE CHARMERS OF INDIA. 317 

Here is another with a tomtom and a curious one- 
stringed fiddle, making what he calls music, but what any- 
other person would call the essence of hideous noise. Here 
is a snake charmer with a basket of wriggling, writhing, red- 
tongued reptiles on his head. He will sometimes open this 
in close proximity to your very eyes, and you involuntarily 
start back amazed and disgusted at the contents of his 
basket. 

"If this snake should bite you," said one of these gentry, 
at the same time opening one of the baskets, "you will die 
in fifteen minutes. If this one should bite you," opening 
another basket, "you will die in ten minutes." Opening 
still another basket, he remarked coolly, " If he should bite 
you, you will die in five minutes," and still another basket 
was opened with the blood-curdling announcement, " If this 
one should bite you, you will die in one minute." By this 
time my friend had gotten almost out of sight and hearing, 
for he did not care to try an} 7 experiments in the interests of 
science. 

The temple of Madura is probably the most magnificent 
in Southern India, as it is certainly the largest which can be 
found in any part of this land of temples. It is impossible 
to describe the thousands and thousands of sculptured pillars, 
the beautiful tessellated pavements, the painted ceilings, and 
the rich ornamental stone-work which abounds everywhere. 
The mind is confused by the very richness and gorgeousness of 
the effect, while at the same time one is tempted to laugh at 
the grotesqueness and weep over the indecency of many of 
the figures. 

The great towers or gopurams of this temple are covered 
with most elaborate figures in stone. This mighty monu- 
ment of heathenism is said to have cost five millions of 
pounds sterling, or twenty-five millions of dollars. The outer 



318 GRIMY GODS AND THEIR GRIMY WORSHIPERS. 



court of the temple is occupied by those who buy and sell 
and get gain, as the Jews of old plied their business in the 

temple courts of Je- 
rusalem. But there 
is no occasion for a 
divine reformer with 
a scourge of small 
cords to drive out 
these traffickers, for 
the worship that 
goes on within the 
Holy of Holies is 
more degrading than 
the business of the 
outer corridors. It 
contains no spiritual 
element. Various 
gods and goddesses 
are seen in dusty lit- 
tle niches, dripping 
with oil and grease, 
and filthy with the 
dust of ages, while 
before them is some 
times prostrated a de- 
vout worshiper al- 
7, most as filthy and as 
greasy as the gods 
themselves. 

But for the most 

THE GREAT TEMPLE OP MADURA. 

part I saw little re- 
spect paid to the temple or the gods of the temple by the 
people who were roaming through its aisles. If they re- 




A CHARACTERISTIC DIVINITY. 



319 



garded the place as sacred, they kept their opinions very 
much to themselves, for it seemed to have little more sanc- 
tity for those whose religion was here embodied, than it 
had for us of Western education who regarded it as repre- 
senting gross superstitions and abominable idolatry. 

In the very Holy of Holies, where the chief god has his 
habitation, no stranger is allowed to go, but as we wandered 




THE PAINTED CORRIDOR IN THE TEMPLE OP MADURA. 



about the temple the High Priest, with a numerous retinue 
before and behind, passed on into this holy place. 

In the center of the temple is a stone bull, which is the 
characteristic divinity of Southern India. This particular 
bull sits in a stone bath tub, which was built around him at 
the time of the last great famine in 1877, in the hope, I 
suppose, that if he sat in the water himself he would cause 
the rains to descend upon the parched fields over which he 
presided as the tutelary divinity. His tub has remained 



320 



AN IDOL S YEARLY OUTING. 



there ever since, though when I saw it it was very dry and 
dusty. 

In another part of Madura is a vast sacred tank, which 
holds a large amount of water. In the middle of this 
artificial lake is a beautiful little island containing a most 
elaborate and costly temple. To this temple, once a year, 
over the green and slimy waters of the tank, the chief god 
of the Madura temple is carried in great state on a raft. 
This great event causes a vast commotion among the people, 
who flock to see the god take his yearly airing, his ride on 
a raft to the temple and, if I mistake not, his bath in the 




THE SACRED TANK OF MADURA. 



sacred tank. Certainly all the gods that I saw in the 
Madura temple looked as if they were sadly in need of at 
least an annual bath. 

The palace of Madura is another building remarkable 
for its architectural grandeur and imposing effect. It rivals, 
in my opinion, the Vatican of Rome. In fact, I have rarely 
seen in any land a building which so impressed me with its 
lofty arches and its noble Byzantine columns. 

It is supposed that a Mahommedan architect must have 
designed this building for the immensely wealthy rajah 
who erected the temple and the palace. Now, however, 
even the memory of the architect, who, in his way, must 
have been a prince of the guild, has passed away. The 



THE TEMPLE AT TANJORE. 



321 



palace is no longer in the hands of the family that built it, 
but is occupied by the British government for its court 
rooms and offices, and for this purpose it affords a most 
admirable building. The old harem of the king is now one 
of the high courts of the Madura district, a far worthier use 




INTERIOR OF THE GREAT PALACE OF MADURA. 

to put the apartment to than that for which it was origin- 
ally designed. 

Another interesting city of Southern India is Tanjore. 
Here, too, the temple is the great attraction of the place, 
though not so vast and elaborate as the temple of Madura. 
It stands by itself and impresses the observer by its solitary 
magnificence more than the swarming towers and endless 



o21 A STATELY TOWER. 

pillars and corridors of the Madura temple. The central 
tower of this temple is 280 feet high, and covers the holy 
of holies in which is the chief idol. This central tower is, to 
my mind, the most magnificent piece of architecture which 
I have seen in Southern India. Next to the Taj Mahal, per- 
haps, it will take the palm from all other architectural 
wonders of the empire. So symmetrical is it, that its 
shadow at noon does not project beyond its base, and the 
tradition is, as our guide told us in his broken English, that 
"it never cast a shadow," but this perpetual miracle is not 
borne out by the facts of the case. 

At the top of the tower is a huge dome, a solid granite 
block. How it could ever be placed in such a position is 
beyond my conception. Tradition says that an inclined 
plane five miles in length was built, up which the stone 
was rolled by forced labor. Everything about this gopuram 
from base to pinnacle is of granite, sculptured in the most 
elaborate wa}^ with figures of men, animals, gods, and 
demons. One of these figures is sometimes called "John 
Bright." It represents a man of European type of counte- 
nance, with an unmistakable English hat on his head. The 
tradition for many years before the British occupancy was 
that men with such features and such "tiles" on their heads 
would sometime conquer and bear sway over India. 

Some have supposed that this figure represents the 
famous traveler, Marco Polo. We found Marco Polo among 
the five hundred Buddhists' effigies in the great temple of 
Canton. Here Ave find his possible effigy in Southern India. 
These traditions show at least how this enterprising traveler 
affected the imagination of many nations. 

Of course we saAV here the famous Nandi, the sacred 
bull of Siva, in this temple as in others. This bull is the 
biggest and most remarkable of all his ston} T companions. 



NANDI, THE SACRED BULL. 



323 



He is sixteen feet long and twelve feet high, and is sculpt- 
ured from a single block of syenite. He is daily anointed 
with oil, and, as the dust accumulates upon his back, he 
is anything but a pleasant and wholesome object to look 
upon. The huge stone from which he is carved weighs hun- 
dreds of tons and must have been brought at least four 
hundred miles, for there is no stone of this description 
within this distance from Tanjore. 

A sculptured water-spout in another part of the temple, 







mm jib's 1 1 » a m -i f t**^ 'm wf> 



THE SACRED BULL OF SIVA, 

brings the greasy water which is poured over the principal 
idol which has his habitation in the most hidden recesses of 
the temple visited only by the high priests, out to the light 
of day, and this water is eagerly caught and drank by hun- 
dreds of devout worshipers. Loathsome and impure as it 
looks, this water is supposed to purify them from all their 
sins. One would rather suppose that it would breed all 
sorts of noxious disease. 

There are other interesting sights in Tanjore besides the 
temple. The palace of the former king of Tanjore is well 
worth visiting. Rather a dilapidated affair it is at present, 

20 



324 A DILAPIDATED PALACE AND USELESS GUN. 

and even in its best estate it must have been somewhat 
tawdry in its decorations, but it is vast in its circumference 
and substantial in its architecture, and not unimposing. 
Here, to this day (though the last rajah died thirty-seven 
years ago), still live some of his many wives and concubines. 
The wives still have a monthly allowance of eight hundred 
rupees from the old estate, and the concubines a grant of 
two hundred rupees a month. 

We saw the place where the women were confined, 
though we did not see the aged matrons themselves. One 
of them, formerly the chief wife, is now about sixty years of 
age, and the younger ones, who as mere children were 
betrothed to the rajah, may still have many years to live, 
though their husband has been dead for nearly two scores 
of summers. The father of the last rajah was a noted man 
in Tanjore; a man of great strength of character and 
ability, which was not inherited by his son. This old rajah 
was a friend of the celebrated English missionary, Schwartz, 
who is buried in an old church near by, and who, more than 
almost any other man of his time, furthered the establish- 
ment of the English government and of English civilization 
in the land to which he had devoted his life. 

Our vivacious guide, anxious to please and to earn his 
salary of a rupee for his day's work, then took us to the big- 
gun of Tanjore. It is a monster, indeed, but about as useless 
as any Quaker gun that was ever bored out of a big cotton- 
wood. This cannon is more than twenty -four feet long, 
made with huge ring's of iron welded together with brass. 
Its circumference is more than ten feet and its bore two feet 
two inches. In all its history it was never fired but once, 
and then so frightened were the gunners and so convinced 
were they of the kicking capacities of their old smooth-bore, 
that they laid a train of powder two miles long, which took 



THE SCENE OF A FAMOUS MUTINY. 325 

forty minutes to burn to the gun. That was the first and 
last time that the ancient cannon was used. Since then it 
has been worshiped as a god in times of peril. It now 
brings to the guides and its keeper some small revenue as an 
object which every traveler must see, and is probably quite 
as useful as ever it was in its peaceful and uneventful life. 

Another interesting town of Southern India is Vellore. 
It is probably little visited by the average traveler, but as a 
city of missionary work it is of decided interest, and also for 
its historic associations, which are well worth recording. 
Here, also, is found a famous old temple, now entirely 
deserted save by owls and bats, its silence never broken by 
the footfall of a single worshiper. But most interesting to 
me was the old fort of Vellore, which was the scene, many 
years ago, of one of the mutinous uprisings of Southern 
India. The English officers and their wives who were sta- 
tioned here were surprised and overpowered, and confined in 
the narrow room over the gateway of the fort. Here they 
waited their expected doom in fear and trembling. Their 
captors, however, before putting them to death could not re- 
strain their desire to sack the fort and make way with the 
gastronomic dainties which they found therein. While they 
were rioting amid the unaccustomed luxuries of the officers' 
quarters, one of the beleaguered prisoners was let down over 
the wall, and, making his way stealthily from the fortress, 
ran with all his might to the nearest garrison, which Avas 
stationed at Eanipet, some fourteen miles away. It was a 
long, hard road, but the man was running for his life and for 
the lives of all his companions, and, breathless and excited, 
he at last reached the garrison at Ranipet. In a few seconds 
the troops were all in their saddles, galloping as fast as their 
steeds could carry them to the rescue of their companions. 
Vellore was fourteen miles away ; the road was by no means 



326 THE WELCOME SOUND OF TRAMPLING HOOFS. 

an easy one ; the bed of a sandy river a mile and a half in 
width must be crossed ; the sand was ankle deep, and was 
very difficult for the horses. But the good steeds and their 
riders pressed on, for they knew that a minute of delay 
might mean death to all their friends at Yellore. The be- 
leaguered prisoners in the room over the gateway counted 
the slow minutes as they dragged on. They knew that soon 
the rioters would be satiated with their plunder, and would 
return to massacre them in their cell-like prison. They 
could not count upon many minutes of respite. They heard 
their keepers discussing how they should be put to death. 
They knew they were about to fall upon them and cut them 
to pieces without mercy, when, in the far distance, they 
thought they heard the hoofs of advancing horses. Nearer 
and nearer came the rescuing troops. The sound of tramping 
feet was never more grateful to strained and wearied ears. 
At last the horsemen were seen galloping along the road which 
led to the castle gate. They pressed into the courtyard and 
cut to pieces the mutineers who w^ere about to crimson their 
blades with the blood of their officers. Scarcely a man 
among the mutineers was left to tell the tale, but the officers 
and their wives in the room over the gateway were saved ; and, 
as they looked at their watches to see how long the rescuing 
troops had been in coming to their relief, it was found that it 
was just fifty minutes from the time that they vaulted into 
the saddle at Banipet to the moment that they were at the 
gates of the castle of Vellore. They had ridden fourteen 
miles, a wide river bed had been crossed, their companions 
rescued, and their enemies put to flight all within an hour. 
No wonder that a full share of praise was bestowed upon the 
gallant horses, panting and reeking with their hard gallop 
across the hot plains under the broiling sun of India. 

As I look upon this fortress, which now is quite deserted 



THE CRUMBLING FORT OF ARGOT. 327 

of all its troops, and saw the wide moat around it, which 
formerly was filled with hungry alligators who snapped up 
any besieger who attempted thus to get within the castle 
gateway, the whole scene seemed to pass before me, and I 
could almost see the strained and eager faces of the beleag- 
uered families looking through the barred gateway. I 
■could almost hear the wild tramp of the rescuing troops. 

To this day, the relatives of Tippoo Sahib, the famous 
mutineer, though he was not implicated in the outrage I 
have described, are confined in the jail within the confines 
of this old castle. 

Another most interesting town of this region is the 
famous old capital of Arcot. Now it is a decadent city and 
the fort itself, so bravely captured and held by Clive, is 
quite deserted and is crumbling to ruins. The massive 
masonry of the old fort, which looks as though it was built 
for all the centuries, is gnawed in many places by the re- 
morseless tooth of time. But it still shows in its massive 
ruggedness what it must have been in the middle of the 
eighteenth century, when it was taken by the brave young 
clerk from Madras, who afterwards became Lord Clive, the 
man who established British supremacy throughout India. 

Clive seems to have had the faculty possessed by Napo- 
leon and Alexander, of inspiring unbounded confidence in 
those under his command. Even the native troops acknowl- 
edged this mighty supremacy, and were ready to lay down 
their lives to obey his slightest behest. "When besieged and 
sorely pressed by the French, and when famine stared them 
in the face, the natives came to him, inspired with his own 
valor, and said, "Do not surrender; we will live on the very 
water in which the rice is cooked, while the English soldiers 
eat the rice, if you will but hold the fort against our com- 
mon enemy." 



328 



ON A SURF-BEATEN SHORE. 



Such valor and leadership would prevail anywhere. No 
wonder that by such men as Clive and Warren Hastings, 
and the great men who have succeeded them, the English 
government is established so strongly throughout this mighty 
empire. The paramount importance of individual leadership 
was never more distinctly shown than in the history of the 
British occupancy of India. That one great leader is worth 




WEAVEKS IN THE STREETS OP MADRAS. 

a hundred thousand men, is a lesson that may be read upon 
every page of India's history. 

The place from which most travelers in Southern India 
embark for the North is the city of Madras ; a great metrop- 
olis with nearly a million of inhabitants, situated on the 
wind-swept and wave-beaten Coromandel coast. Until re- 
cently there has not been even a breakwater to partially 
defend the surf -washed shore. "With the greatest difficulty 



A DIFFICULT LANDING PLACE. 



329 



at times vessels are loaded and unloaded even with the 
breakwater, which now defends the artificial harbor to some 
extent. The surf beats upon the shore most violently when 
the wind is in certain quarters. The travelers who are 
about to embark are still borne upon the brawny shoulders 
of coolies, and deposited in deep native boats, which are 
composed of planks bound together with thongs and caulked 
with cocoanut fibre, in which no nails or rivets are used, 




CHILD ON A LEAF OF THE VICTORIA REOIA. 

since they would soon be wrenched out of their places by 
the bufferings of the heavy surf. 

Some beautiful government buildings there are in 
Madras; the law courts being especially fine. This build- 
ing, designed after the architecture of a Mahommedan 
mosque, is crowded with minarets and domes projecting 
from every angle. But this splendid structure, and a few 
others like it, only emphasizes and makes more marked the 
squalor of the native section. However, the climate is not 
severe. Little shelter and less energy are required in order 
to live ; the wants of the people are few, and perhaps they 



330 



LIFE IN THE STREETS OF MADRAS. 



are as happy as their more favored companions in other 
cities and climes. 

Here in the tanks and reservoirs are found not only the 
sacred lotus flowers with their broad leaves, but the Vic- 
toria Kegia, many of which are quite strong and laro-e 
enough to hold a child three to four years of age. A little 
brown-faced baby, when weighed, tipped the scales at just 
twenty-eight and a half pounds, and the leaf upon which he 
sat hardly shipped a cupful of water under his weight. 



trkjm ; 




THE POPULAR MADRAS HUNT. 



In the streets of Madras as in all these Eastern cities 
may be seen every possible occupation going on before the 
face and' eyes of the world. Here are the weavers and the 
carpenters and the shoemakers and the barbers, and every- 
where the inevitable throng of loafers. 

It is not at all uncommon to see a row of old men and 
women, and younger ones, too, for that matter, sitting in 
the glaring sunlight engaged in "the Madras hunt," where 
the unhappy hunting grounds are each other's heads. 

One day a wedding procession passed by. Three silent- 



s"& a 




bratty" makers and "punkah-wallahs. 



333 



treading, knock-kneed, ragged camels led the way, covered 
with bright cloths and much tinsel. There seemed to be 
little merriment or life about the procession, and I presume 
the poor young girl who was going to the home of her aged 
husband, whom perhaps she had never seen, felt as melan- 
choly as the solemn procession seemed to indicate. 

The extreme pov- 
erty of the people is 
perhaps nowhere more 
indicated than by the ( '/-jj| 
women whose business 
it is to pick up every v/ 
particle of manure from t 
the streets, and to make '• 
it into flat cakes (" Brat- 
ty" as it is called), 
which they dry upon 
the sides of the walls 
of the houses. Then it 
is picked off and sold 
for fuel. Hundreds of 
these women with high- 
piled baskets of this 
fuel are met with every- 
where as one goes about 
the streets. 

The " punkah- wallah," too, or the man who pulls the 
huge fans with which every office, dining-room, parlor, and 
church is provided, is a well-known character in Madras, as 
in all Southern India. I must say I have seen days in New 
York and Boston when a punkah was as necessary as it 
even is in hot Madras. This occupation often descends from 
father to son, for many generations, and the true punkah- 




" bratty" making. 



334 EXTREMES OF SOCIAL LIFE. 

wallah, by instinct and training becomes so expert that, 
tying the string to his toe, he will go to sleep and still keep 
jerking away at the cord to fan the hot brows of the Euro- 
peans within, who may be dining, or reading, or writing, or 
sleeping, as the case may be. 

In the streets of Madras I have frequently seen the 
women and dogs lying together in the glaring bright sun- 
light, one apparently as happy and as unconscious of degra- 
dation as the other. 

On the other hand, many among these people are well 
educated, and bright and intellectual. The magnificent law 
courts are crowded with native lawyers, who are as fine 
a body of men in their gowns and wigs as can be met with 
in any hall of justice in the world. 

Nowhere does one meet with greater extremes of social 
life. Nowhere is there greater need or greater scope for the 
life-giving religion of Christ than in this swarming city of 
India. Here, in Madras, I am glad to say there is much 
missionary activity. In some parts of the Presidency the 
Telugu people are flocking to the standard of the Cross 
by tens of thousands, and it seems to be only a question 
of time when the walls of caste prejudice shall be broken 
down and when the empire of India shall take its place 
among the great Christian empires of the world. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

PEN PICTURES FROM NORTHERN INDIA. 

The Mouth of the Hoogly — A Precaution — From the Parisian to the 
Pariah — The Great Banyan of the Geographies — Ten Thousand 
Troops under its Shade — The Burning Ghat — A Sidewalk Barber's 
Shop — A Ghastly Group — Innumerable Beggars — Religious Parasites 

— The Old Fakir's Offering — The Bathers in the Ganges — A Devoted 
Son — Dying at her Leisure — A Burning Ghat — Decorations after the 
Bath — Burning the Dead — Hindu Theology — Towers of Silence — 
Dreary Biers and Hungry Vultures — A Cannibal Feast — The Jews of 
India — Why They Give their Bodies to the Vultures — The Bondage of 
Caste — Paying Dear for his Dinners — A Venerable Bridegroom — 
Match Makers in India — The Stars Favorable and Marriages Frequent 

— A Wedding Procession — A Pathetic Mite of a Bride — A Matter-of- 
fact Wooer. 




I HO IT Madras to Calcutta the voy- 
age is comparatively uninteresting' 
until one draws near to the great 
political Capital of India. As we 
near the mouth of the Hoogly 
river, one of the great Deltas of the 
Ganges, which pours its muddy 
waters into the Bay of Bengal, for 
many miles the eye can follow the 
distinct line of demarkation be- 
tween the fresh water of the sacred 
river and the salt water of the bay. 
After a little the low line of palm trees on one side 
shows that we have entered the vast and capacious mouth of 
the Hoogly, which of all rivers is most difficult of navigation 
on account of its shifting sands and its treacherous shoals. 

( 335 ) 



33G THE MOTLEY POPULATION OF CALCUTTA. 

While the passengers were at "tiffin" the stewards closed 
all the ports of the vessel, and when we asked the reason for 
this summary shutting off of our supply of fresh air, the 
captain informed us that we would have a better chance of 
escape if the vessel should strike a sandbank and keel over, as 
more than one vessel had been known to do. 

A distressing disaster of this kind occurred not many 
months since when all the passengers were below, either 
in their cabins or the public saloon, and many of them were 
drowned like rats in their holes. 

However, a good Providence favored us, no accident or 
delay occurred, and, on the morning of the 3d day after 
leaving Madras, the " Chusan " steamed up to her dock in 
the busy port of Calcutta. 

This city is one of the most interesting in all the East, 
interesting not solely or chiefly on account of its splendid 
government buildings or fine warehouses or expensive docks, 
but more especially to the traveler because of its conglomerate 
population of every shade and color, every nationality and 
costume on the face of the earth, from the Parisian-clad 
European to the Pariah in all his squalid nakedness. 

In some particulars the zoological gardens in Calcutta are 
quite beyond any of their European rivals ; the collection of 
parrots, for instance, is surprisingly large, their plumage 
most gaudy ; and the pigeons, some of them as large as 
Guinea hens, with tufted crests and fan-like topknots, Avere 
the most unique I have ever seen. 

The botanical gardens are even larger and finer than the 
zoological. The most interesting feature here is the great 
banyan, which is said to be the model from which the 
banyan of the old geographies was drawn. It is stated that 
10,000 troops can be mustered under the shade of this tree. 
How many hundreds of thousands of school bovs and school 



THE BANYAN OF OUR SCHOOL DAYS. 337 

girls have in imagination gathered beneath its umbrageous 
shade it would be impossible to reckon. 

But here it stands just as it looked in the geography of 
our school days, with its drooping pendants, which, after a 
time, take root and develop into huge trunks, only to send 
out other pendants, which, in turn, develop into other trunks,. 
and so on, ad infinitum. There seems to be no limit to the 
growth of a well-developed and carefully cultured banyan 
tree. Theoretically, at least, it might cover a province or a 
nation, or grow indefinitely until it reached a climate or a 
soil in which it could no longer nourish. 

The " burning ghat " is another famous place in the en- 
virons of Calcutta. This is a huge, one-storied, shed-like 
building, in which the bodies of deceased Hindus are 
burned. As this particular " ghat " is situated on the banks 
of the sacred Ganges it is a very famous one, and the fires 
within are perpetually kept burning. 

Let us take a drive there this bright February morning. 
Our little party will just fill a gharri, one of the character- 
istic vehicles of this Eastern land. We will put up the 
blinds on every side so that we can look out in every direc- 
tion, and miss none of the sights and bits of scenery which 
are sure to greet our eyes. 

The sun has just risen, for the early morning is the best 
time to visit the ghat. The poorer part of the native popula- 
tion is shaking itself awake after the slumbers of the night. 
It does not take the poor people of Calcutta long to make 
their toilets. Their mats are spread in little recesses from 
the sidewalks which they call their homes, and all that is 
necessary for them to do in the morning, is to straighten up 
from their recumbent position, roll up their mats, wash 
their faces at the nearest fountain or public faucet, or, in 
default of one of these, at the nearest pool of stagnant water 



338 



ON THE WAY TO THE BURNING GHAT. 



or mud puddle. They seemed to take great pains with their 
teeth, and we see scores of them this early morning brushing 
and washing their mouths most assiduously ; the bright, 
brass water jars near by holding the little water that is nec- 
essary for this internal ablution. 

Even at this early morning hour, Calcutta's swarming 
myriads are beginning their daily toil. Shop doors are 
opening, early birds are looking for the unwary worms, and 
the bustle and hum of life begins. Here, for instance, quite 




A CALCUTTA BARBER SHOP. 



on the sidewalk, a Hindu barber, in white cloth and turban, 
is sitting on his haunches, assiduously scraping off the hirsute 
growth of another Hindu who, during the operation, gazes 
on his own homely face in a glass which he himself holds. 
Could a more uncomfortable barber's chair be imagined ? 

As we draw near to the sacred Ganges, the crowd of pil- 
grims that is also wending its way thither grows larger, 
more cosmopolitan and more interesting. Here are Hindus 
from every part of India and of every conceivable caste. 
Here are fakirs whose holiness and sanctity are measured by 



A PARADISE OP TRAMPS AND MENDICANTS. 



339 



the length of their hair, and apparently, by the thickness of 
the coat of dirt upon their vile bodies ; and here also are 
many common people representing all classes and conditions 
of Hindus. In one place beside the road is a curious group 
gathered around a pile of sacred ashes. They look pecu- 
liarly ghastly in the bright sunlight of the early morning, for 
they have anointed themselves 
with oil from top to toe, and 
have then besmeared themselves 
with the ashes. A singularly 
gray and grizzly look is given to 
them by this operation. Still 
others have gone down to the 
waters of the sacred stream 
which flows near by, and have 
covered themselves over, from 
the crowns of their heads to 
the soles of their feet, with the 
slime and mud from the river's 
banks. By the side of the road 
are numberless beggars with 
little piles of rice before them. 
This has been given them by 
the devotees who have just 
bathed in the Ganges, for it is 
considered a peculiarly meritorious act to give something in 
charity after the morning bath in the holy waters. Of 
course beggars take advantage of such generosity, and swarm 
in almost innumerable throngs to this spot, which may be 
considered the very paradise of tramps and mendicants. 

It also goes without saying that the superstition of the 
people is taken full advantage of by the religious parasites 
who live on the fears of the ignorant. 




A HINDU FAKIR. 



340 



HOW TO OFFER A GIFT TO THE GANGES. 



Here is an old fakir with long, ropy hair and a thick 
crust of dirt on legs and arms, and hairy breast, who has a 
little shrine in which are three brass gods. We try to buy 
one of the gods to take home to our friends as a sample of 
what is actually worshiped on the banks of the Ganges, but 
the wily old fellow tells us that these gods have been conse- 
crated and that they are not for sale, 
but that if we will go to the bazaar 
we can get images just like them for 
a few annas apiece. He further 
intimates that if we wish to make 
an offering to the gods, he will not 
object. 

" But what would you do with a 
rupee, if we should give it to you % " 
we asked. "Why, I would make 
an offering of it to the Ganges," he 
replied. " But you do not mean 
that you would throw good silver 
into that muddy river? "No," he 
replied, " I would buy rice with it 
and eat the rice, but I would throw 
some grains of it in the river and 
thus dedicate your rupee." Perhaps- 
the man's honesty demanded a re- 
ward, but it was very evident, even if he had not told us so, 
that the offering to the Ganges would be made in a meta- 
phorical and Pickwickian sense. 

Beside this old fakir was a poor fellow who was born 
without arms ; next to him, a man with his legs cut off above 
the knees ; a woman came next with a puny, shivering, sickly 
baby in her arms ; all appealing to the generosity and com- 
passion of the devotees, who, as they passed by, were very 




A LONG HAIRED FAKIR. 



BATHING IN THE SACRED STREAM. 341 

likely to throw them a quarter of an anna piece or at least a 
handful of rice. 

As we look toward the river, we see it thronged with 
bathers, men and women alike, in scant bathing clothes, 
dipping and splashing and sousing the sacred water over 
their bodies with great abandon. After a few moments in 
the water they come up to the bank to dry themselves in 
the sun, and put on dry clothes, a very easy process of dress- 
ing, where the only garment consists of a single strip of 
cloth, while some of the poorer ones walk off to their homes, 
dripping and shivering with their wet wrappings clinging to 
their limbs. 

One old woman whom we saw thus journeying home- 
ward, her dripping cloth marking every footstep, shivered in 
the cold morning air as though stricken with palsy. Poor 
old devotee ! I fear that she will not stand many such 
baths even in the sacred Ganges, for, as she trudges off to 
her home in her dripping garments, her consumptive cough 
and emaciated body tell us that she is near her end. Perhaps 
the next time she comes she will be brought by her children 
to breathe her last gasp on the holy bank, for it is thought 
to be a very meritorious thing to die on these sacred shores. 

Just before the breath is thought to be about to leave the 
body, dying Hindus are often brought hither. Sometimes, 
however, there is miscalculation, and the person is not so 
near his end as is supposed. In such circumstances it is- 
said, though I cannot vouch for the truth of the story, that 
the mouth of the dying person is filled with sacred mud, and 
the end is thus hastened; for it is not within the bounds of 
custom (and custom here is as the laws of the Medes and 
Persians) for a person who has once been brought to the 
banks of the Ganges to be taken home again, however lon°* 
he may obstinately persist in living. 

21 



342 DECORATING AFTER THE BATH. 

One devoted son of whom I have heard, has built a little 
house for his mother, whom some years ago he brought to 
the river's bank on the supposition that she was about to 
give up the ghost. She did not die, however, as was ex- 
pected, but persisted in getting better ; so there was nothing 
for this filial son to do, as she could not be taken back to her 
house again, but to build a little house for her on the banks 
of the river, where she might wait her end and die at her 
leisure. 

At one place which we pass, a wealthy Hindu, as an act 
of religious merit, has built a " bathing ghat." As we look 
into this ghat or bath house, which is open to all sight-seers, 
as well as to the four winds of heaven, being simply a 
covered shed with a tessellated stone pavement, we see the 
pilgrims who have just bathed in the river receiving their 
morning shampoo. 

Men who understand the business are rubbing and knead- 
ing the bathers most assiduously, after which they are 
anointed with oil, their eyebrows and finger nails are 
stained with the proper pigment, and sacred ashes in red and 
white and yellow are mixed with oil and rubbed upon their 
foreheads in a most artistic way, in lines and circles and 
little spots, which often have the effect of a coarse kind of 
tattoo. 

But all this time we have been drawing near the " house 
of burning," though our progress has been slow on account 
of the number of interesting sights on every hand which 
claim our attention. 

Here is the famous ghat at last. After being conducted 
through one or two small ante-rooms we come to a large, 
shed-like building which opens upon the Ganges on one side, 
while the side next to the public road is entirely closed to 
view. There is no roof to intercept the passage of the 



THE BURNING GHAT. 



343 



smoke from the burning bodies to the stars. In the soil 
around which the walls of the enclosure are built are eigh- 
teen hollow places about six feet long and two feet wide. 
Here the bodies are laid ; wood and straw is piled around, 
over and under them ; the nearest relative lights the fire ; 
the poor, human clay, deserted of its spiritual tenant, is 
wrapt in flames, and in about two hours nothing is left but 




THE BURNING GHAT. 



a little pile of ashes, which is carefully swept up and thrown 
into the sacred waters which flow near by. 

Poor people who cannot afford to burn their relatives 
light a little wisp of straw, blacken their faces with it, and 
throw the bodies unceremoniously into the Ganges. For- 
merly it was said that travelers up the river met many of 
these deserted human tenements floating down the stream. 
Now, I think, the practice is forbidden by law, and the 
sight of floating bodies is uncommon, but by no means 
unknown. 



344 PAYING FOR THE REPOSE OF THE DEPARTED. 

' On the day of our visit to the burning ghat there was 
but one body undergoing cremation, and that the body of a 
little child. The morning before, however, the attendant 
told us that no less than eleven of the eighteen ghastly fire- 
places were filled with burning bodies at one time, and an 
average of twenty each day are brought to this particular 
ghat for cremation. 

Hindu theology says that after the body has been burned, 
the parts all are joined once more and must march through 
a river of mire and blood, but if the friends of the dead man 
will give the Brahmin a cow, his journey will be much 
easier ; this is certainly a very convenient doctrine for the 
Brahmin priest to promulgate. 

After the dead man gets beyond this unpleasant spot he 
must walk over ground like fiery hot copper, and if a pair of 
shoes is donated to the priest it would be more pleasant for 
the departed spirit. Next the spirit comes to a road full of 
spikes, and if the friends will only give the Brahmin a bed- 
spread, the spirit need not lie upon the spikes. By this time 
the priest is pretty well fitted out, and the departed spirit is 
allowed to get along as best it can. Thus do these mercen- 
ary religionists prey upon the fears and superstitions of their 
ignorant followers. What a contrast this to the unselfish 
invitation, " Come unto Me and I will give 3^011 rest." 

If, now, in imagination, we pass over the 1,500 miles of 
mountain and valley and spreading plain that stretch be- 
tween Calcutta and the commercial capital of India, 
Bombay, Ave shall find still another very peculiar process of 
disposing of the dead, for in Bombay are 80,000 Parsees, 
who neither bury nor burn, but expose their dead on towers 
built on hill tops, called " Towers of Silence." The Towers 
of Silence in Bombay number, five, and are situated in the 
midst. of a beautiful garden. It is a most impressive and 



THE TOWERS OF SILENCE. 



345 



solemn place, and, though exceedingly revolting in some of 
its particulars to the Western mind, is nevertheless a place 
of intense interest. 

After death the body of the Parsee is taken to the lowest 
floor of the house in which the dead person was born. There 
the priests pray for the soul that has left the body, and a 
dog is brought in to look at the corpse. Afterwards it is 
wrapped in a sheet, laid on an iron bier, and carried to one 
of the Towers of Silence. The friends follow on foot, as no 
carriages are allowed at a Parsee funeral. The mourners 




"A Mi. )i^m i t 



J0 



A TOWER OF SILENCE. 



are all dressed in white and walk in pairs, each pair holding 
a white handkerchief between them. 

The largest tower of silence in Bombay is a round build- 
ing, in which are 72 spaces for the bodies of men next to the 
wall, just below the spaces for the men are 72 more small 
places for the bodies of women, and, below them, 72 still 
smaller grooves for the bodies of children. Between the 
spaces for the men, women, and children, are little footpaths. 
On these dreary biers are laid the dead bodies of the de- 
parted, and, before the attendant Parsees have left the 
silent tower, the hungry vultures, which are always sitting 



346 THE FEAST OF THE VULTURES. 

like horrid Harpies on the edge of the tower, swoop down 
and tear the flesh from the bones and fly back to their filthy 
perches. Thus they dispute for the last morsel of the dead 
body until only the bleaching bones remain. After the 
skeleton of the dead man has been left for some three or 
four weeks on the tower, the bones are thrown into a well 
in the middle of the tower, where they decompose after a 
while into lime, and are washed out by the descending rains, 
and are thus finally disposed of. There is something pecu- 
liarly disgusting to many minds about such a disposal of the 
dead, but, from a sanitary point of view, the physicians say 
that it is not by any means the worst of methods. 

On the day of our visit fully one hundred of the thou- 
sand vultures which are said to haunt the towers of silence 
were sitting in a dreadfully suggestive way on the edge of 
their stone parapets, waiting for the horrible feast which 
would be spread for them before the day was over. 

There are many things of living, healthful interest in this 
great city of Bombay. The streets are wide in some por- 
tions of the city, and lined with really magnificent build- 
ings. As one drives along the street he sees not only 
Hindus of every caste and condition of life, but Parsees with 
their curious glazed caps, Jains with their two-cornered 
turbans, and Arabians in voluminous garments with coils of 
camel's hair around their heads. 

Brilliant colors, too, abound everywhere, — red, and 
green, and blue; while the higher class women in their 
graceful, transparent, silken- robes, interwoven with delicate 
figures in subdued colors, add a very picturesque element to 
the crowded streets. 

The Mohammedans are of course very numerous. It is 
said that there are more Mohammedans in Bombay than in 
any other city in the world. 



A POLYGLOT POPULATION. 347 

Of all this polyglot population, the Parsees are the 
most interesting. Many of them are well-to-do and some 
of them are very wealthy. Their cast of countenance is. 
decidedly Jewish, and their long aquiline noses and shrewd 
business features would not look out of place in the Jewish 
quarters of Amsterdam or Frankfort. Their great teacher- 
was Zoroaster, who lived 1,200 years before Christ, and their 
religion has few of the revolting, idolatrous elements which 
characterize the mass of heathen religions. 

They are sometimes called fire- worshipers, which is not,, 
however, a correct designation. In worshiping God they 
say one ought to look at some of the wonderful things that, 
He has made, such as the sun, the moon, the water, or fire,, 
not that these elements are gods but in them they see God 
revealed. 

This idea lies at the root of their burial practices. They 
cannot put the bodies in the ground according to their 
notions, or else the earth would be defiled. They cannot 
burn them, for fire is a sacred element. They cannot throw 
them into the river, for the water would be desecrated, but 
the vultures, being unclean birds, can dispose of the dead 
bodies without defiling land or water, fire or earth. 

If one walks in the beautiful Yictoria Gardens towards 
sundown, he will see the greatest variety of Eastern peoples 
to be found on any spot on the face of the earth. Accord- 
ing to the latest census, in Bombay alone, sixty-one different 
languages are spoken, and the castes are almost innumer- 
able. The distinctions of caste are giving way to some 
extent in Bombay as in other parts of India, but very, very 
slowly, and among the great masses of population it is still 
considered a most disgraceful and outrageous thing to lose 
one's caste. 

A mother will turn her child out of doors if he eats a, 



348 THE RIGORS OF CASTE. 

particle of food that is prepared by a woman of lo:ver caste. 
A woman will desert her husband whom she suspects, not of 
marital unfaithfulness, but of having dined with some one 
of lower rank than himself. Even the cooks in the kitchen 
will shake the dust from off their feet and 'indignantly leave 
the service of him who has in any way broken his caste and 
defiled himself by forgetting the strict ceremonial observ- 
ance which the bondage of the ages has imposed. 

Here is a paragraph which I have just clipped from an 
Allahabad paper. " In order to be allowed the privileges of 
the caste to which he belongs, a young Bengalee barrister, 
who had just returned from England, performed the other 
day an exceedingly unpleasant PrayaschiUa ceremony, in 
the presence of pundits and many Hindu gentlemen. It is a 
distinctive feature of the Hindus of the present day that 
they are not reluctant to re-admit into their fold those 
whom they regard as social sinners of the blackest dye. 
But how that barrister's English friends would have stared, 
if, while he was eating his dinners in London, he had told 
them what he would have to eat" on his return home." 

What this ceremony of regaining caste is, is not to be 
explained here. It would not be possible to enter into 
details for they are not for ears polite, and we will only say 
that this young barrister had to eat the vilest compound 
which can be possibly imagined, to pay for the gay dinners 
of which he had partaken in the land across the sea. 

Here is another paragraph from one of these progressive 
papers, which shows the impatience of modern Hindu life 
with the ceremonial shackles of the past : " He is aged 82 
and he is to marry a girl of the same sect, aged 10. They 
are both Madhwas, and the holy rite of matrimony will be 
performed at Madras ; yet people say we live in a progress- 
ive age ! " 



MATCH-MAKING AS A PROFESSION. 



349 



Though the bridegroom is not often so old as the vener- 
able party here alluded to, the bride is often quite as young, 
and frequently much younger than the ten-}^ ear-old girl who 
was sold into matrimonial slavery at Madras. The usual 
age for a man to marry is sixteen or seventeen, the frequent 
age for a girl, eight or nine. Not uncommonly she is 




A HINDU BRIDE. 



married when three or four years of age, though she does 
not go to live at once in her husband's house. 

The business of the match-makers in India is not a secret 
and clandestine affair as in America, nor are match-makers 
looked upon as meddlers with other people's business, but it 
is an open, honorable, and avowed occupation. 

These match-makers spend their time in going about 
arranging for marriages. "When they have found a boy and 
a girl that they think will make a good couple, they go to 



350 A WEDDING PROCESSION. 

the parents and talk the matter over, praising up the little 
girl to the parenjts of the boy, and lauding the beauty and 
the wealth and the good disposition of the boy to the girl's 
parents. Of course their descriptions are taken with a grain 
of salt, and the matchmakers' glowing accounts are not 
altogether trusted, but they are usually the intermediaries 
through whom the youthful pair are brought together. 

When we were in Bombay, the stars were favorable, and 
the priests proclaimed that for many months to come there 
would not be such desirable heavenly auspices for connubial 
bliss. On this account weddings were very frequent, and we 
could scarcely go along any of the crowded streets where 
Hindus most do congregate without seeing one or more 
wedding processions. 

They were most gorgeous affairs. First would come a 
brass band blaring with its trumpets and beating its cymbals 
and drums. Then would come the family friends of the bride 
and bridegroom arrayed in all their finery of bright-colored 
silks; their arms, wrists, noses, and ears bedecked with 
chains and bracelets, jewels, and rings, large and small, of 
most elaborate designs. Then frequently we would see the 
bridegroom trying to look grave and dignified with all the 
burden of his sixteen years resting heavily upon his 
shoulders. Often he would be decked and garlanded with 
flowers and chains and jewels so that his face was scarcely 
visible. Sometimes a companion would walk by his side 
solemnly fanning him. 

The bridegroom is usually perched upon a high horse, 
and if the later stages of the wedding have been reached 
the little bride is often seen behind her husband. Frequently 
she is a tiny, pathetic little mite indeed. She ought to be in 
the nursery playing with her dolls, or in the kindergarten 
learning her A B C's, but instead of this the responsibilities 



EXPENSIVE CEREMONIES. 



351 



of womanhood have been thrust on her in her infancy, and 
she is borne off to her husband's house t$> live the stupid, 
uneventful life of the zenana. 

The wedding ceremonies last many days, and are accom- 
panied by great expense to the father and mother of the 
bride at whose house they take place. Oftentimes the poor 
man will spend his last rupee, mortgage his property, and go 
in debt for years to come for the sake of giving his daughter 
a proper wedding feast. 

Though he lives in rags, dirt, and poverty, the little girl 




A ZENANA CARRIAGE OP BOMBAY. 



must for once be decked in silks and jewels before she is 
carried off to her husband's home. The missionary is fre- 
quently called upon to act as matchmaker between the 
Christian boys and girls. One of ray friends was recently 
asked by a promising young man to speak to a girl of whom 
he had heard good reports as likely to make a suitable wife. 
He had never seen her but once in his life, and then at a 
distance. 

The missionary undertook the delicate matter, but the 
girl refused the offer point-blank. The ardent swain, how- 
ever, was by no means discouraged, for Avhen my friend told 



352 



MAKING THE BEST OF IT. 



him of his fortune, he remarked that he was glad to know 
of the matter without any unnecessary delay, since he 
already had another damsel in mind for the position, to 
whom he hoped the missionary would make his next applica- 
tion. No doubt final success smiled upon this persistent 
though somewhat nonchalant lover. 

These matchmakers' marriages do not always turn out as 
unhappily as might be supposed, by any means. The young 
couple, thus brought together, make the best of their circum- 
stances and of each other. The husband is usually affection- 
ate, and the wife, from the very force of circumstances, faith- 
ful. If love's passionate young dream is not experienced, 
neither is the frequent disillusionment and reaction of mar- 
ried life in more northern climes, and it is pleasant to believe 
as we leave this subject that behind the walls of many of the 
poor mud huts of India, as everywhere else in this old world, 
is much conjugal felicity, parental affection, and filial 
devotion. 




CHAPTEK XIX. 

IN THE COUNTRY OF THE GREAT MUTINY. 

Across Northern India by Rail — In an Indian Sleeping Car — Scenes from 
our Car Window — Storks and Penguins, Monkeys and Jackals — " It 
is a Beautiful Morning ; Come, Let Us Kill Something " — Defiling a 
Peddler's Sweetmeats — A Work of Patience and Diplomacy — An 
Every Day Conversation in India — The Mecca of the Brahmins — The 
Monkey Temple — Cawnpore of Bloody Memory — An Awful Page of 
History — The Angel of Remembrance — Memories of Lucknow — 
The Gallant Lawrence — Havelock's Troops to the Rescue — The 
Hero's Grave — The Cannon Ball that Robbed the Mother of Her Babe 
— The City of the Taj Mahal — The Mogul's Promise and How He 
Kept It — "In Memory of an Immortal Love" — The Hand of the 
Vandal — "Jane Higginbottom " in the Taj — How the Old King 
Played Parchesi. 




|ROM Calcutta to Bombay, as the 
crow flies, is not much more than 
a thousand miles, but by the way 
that most travelers journey it is 
fully twice that distance, since a 
considerable detour must be made 
to take in the historic cities of 
Benares. Allahabad, Lucknow, 
Cawnpore, and Agra. 

It is a journey well worth tak- 
ing, I assure you, dear reader, for 
it leaves upon the memory of 
every traveler indelible photographs of marvelous temples 
and incomparable mausoleums ; of fortresses and battle 
grounds, made sacred by the blood of heroic men and 
women; besides many more peaceful pictures of smiling 

(353) 



354 THE RAILWAYS OF NORTHERN INDIA. 

fields and thronging villages, and gaily dressed crowds of 
people that are constantly moving in a kaleidoscopic way 
across our picture. 

The railway train in which we set forth, like all Indian 
railway trains, is divided into first, second, and third-class 
compartments, with an intermediate class corresponding to 
the third-class, for European travelers only. The fares are 
exceedingly cheap except in the first-class compartments, and 
even there they are not extravagant according to our West- 
ern notions. Tickets in the third-class carriages cost less 
than one-half cent a mile, in the second-class about one cent 
a mile, and in the first-class about two cents for the same 
distance. As a result of these fares, the third-class carriages 
are always crowded with native travelers ; the second-class 
are sparingly used by Europeans, and the first-class compart- 
ments are run at a dead loss to the railway company. You 
need not expect any remarkably luxurious accommodation 
even in the first-class cars, as we warned you when writing 
of railway travel in Southern India. No deft porters make 
np our sleeping berths for us ; no luxurious arm chairs invite 
rest and repose ; no nickel-plated lavatories and toilet rooms 
fitted up with all kinds of Yankee contrivances need Ave 
expect. If we take our own servant, as many travelers in 
India do, he will spread our blankets and quilts, which we 
must carry with us, upon the seats when night comes, and 
arrange our pillows as comfortably as may be. He will 
then seek his own place in a third-class carriage while we 
betake ourselves to the Land of Nod as quickly as possible, 
for the dull and smoky lamps afford no inducement to sit up 
to read after the evening lamps of the sky have been set 
aglow. 

While daylight lasts, however, there is plenty to attract 
ns in the varied scenery through which we are continually 



BEAUTIFUL AND FEARLESS WILD BIRDS. 355 

passing. Village succeeds village, a curious throng at one 
station is succeeded by a more curious throng, as it seems to 
us, at the next station, and all is life and bustle wherever 
the train stops. 

Looking from the car window one sees more wild birds 
and beasts in an hour when passing over the plains of North- 
ern India than he would see in twenty -four hours in Amer- 
ica. The Hindu regard for life has caused birds and beasts to 
multiply and abound everywhere. Saucy crows with grey 
necks, and bright, bead-like eyes, will almost pluck food out 
of your very hands as you are eating your midday lunch ; 
green parrots by the hundred will scream at you from the 
telegraph wires; owls will hoot from their undisturbed 
perch on the top of the telegraph poles ; beautiful birds in 
blue and crimson plumage will flutter about the branches 
wherever a tree is to be seen ; great, red-headed storks, 
standing almost as high as a man, will unblinkingly contem- 
plate the rushing train as they stand upon one foot gazing 
after us ; solemn penguins with heavy bills and huge pouches 
beneath, will watch us from the bogs in which they are get- 
ting their noonday meals ; herd's of spotted deer will scamper 
away as the train approaches ; jackals will sneak out of 
sight, and monkeys will grin and chatter at us from the 
overhanging branches ; while the familiar and impudent 
blackbirds and jackdaws will perch on the horns of the goats 
and cattle as we rush by the pastures, so sure are they, after 
centuries of protection, that they will not be disturbed. 

What a pity it is that in America every cruel schoolboy, 
before he reaches the age of mercy and humanity, is allowed 
to have his rifle and shotgun to pop away at the poor, harm- 
less creatures which God has made, driving them into the 
solitary wilderness where alone they can expect to rear their 

young in safety and peace. 
22 



356 



AN EDUCATION IN CRUELTY. 



" It is a beautiful morning ; come, let us kill something," 
is the sarcastic Frenchman's comment on the average 
" shooting " Englishman ; a comment which will apply as 
well to the average American, I am sorry to say. Some- 
thing besides game laws and legislative enactments are 
necessary to preserve the sylvan life of our woods and fields. 
Better is the superstitious dread of the Hindu in regard to 
life-taking than the indifferent cruelty of the Anglo-Saxon. 

When we stop at the stations and show ourselves on the 




A NATIVE "TURN-OUT." 

platform, a motley throng gathers about us. Here is the 
fruit vendor with his yellow bananas, his loose-jacket 
oranges, his guavas which require a considerable course of 
education before one can enjoy them. Our taste is educated 
up to bananas and oranges and we can buy as many as 
Ave please for a quarter of an anna, or about half a cent 
apiece. 

Here comes some other railway vendors, with trays full 
of cakes and sweets of a very doubtful and curious character 
to our unaccustomed eyes. 



AN UNFLATTERING ESTIMATE. 357 

The peddler sets them down from his head, where he 
always carries them, as every other bundle is carried in 
India, and we are about to take one of them from his tray 
to see what it is, when with a gesture of horror, he prevents 
us from doing so, and insists upon our pointing to what we 
want from a respectful distance. We soon learn that we 
should defile all his tray-full of goods by so much as touch- 
ing one of his sweetmeats with our little finger, so polluted 
are we in his Hindu eyes; and yet the same peddler is 
doubtless a sweaty, dirty, ragged, and generally disreputable 
fellow, who, from his appearance, has not had a decent bath 
for a year. 

It raises our Yankee ire somewhat to be regarded as 
an unclean pariah by this dirty specimen of humanity, but 
we submit to the inevitable, point to the particular goods 
that we want, pay for them with a few small copper coins, 
and take our place once more in our carriage to enjoy our 
unaccustomed feast. 

Besides these peddlers of fruits and sweets, every large 
station abounds with venders of more substantial wares; 
brass-work from Benares, inlaid marble curios from Agra, 
curiously painted metal plates and cups from Moradabad, 
and clay figures of all kinds and shapes and sizes from 
Lucknow. 

To buy any article in India is a work of patience and 
diplomacy, on the part of both buyer and seller. In this 
land I have often thought of Solomon's description of the 
purchaser : " It is naught, it is naught, saith the buyer, but 
when he is gone his way, then he boasteth." Here is the 
conversation that is usually preliminary to a purchase in 
India. "How much for this clay figure V asks the buyer. 

" One rupee," answers the seller. 

" Too much," is the invariable reply of the buyer ; and so 



358 DRIVING A BARGAIN. 

it is, for the seller always asks at least three or four times 
as much as he expects to take. 

"How much will you give then?" asks the merchant. 

"Two annas" (one eighth of a rupee), says the prospect- 
ive buyer, thinking he will be sure to make his offer low 
enough. 

With a gesture of surprise and almost indignation the 
vender repudiates the offer, as much as to say : " This is 
simply outrageous. Do you insult a man by offering him 
one-eighth of what a thing is worth ? However, seeing that 
it is you, and since I regard you as a very good friend, I 
will throw off a little something; you may have it for 
twelve annas." 

"No, no," says the buyer, "I will give you two annas, 
take it or leave it as you choose." 

"What a hard-hearted, cruel individual you are," the 
merchant by every look and gesture seems to say; "you 
would rob the dead of their grave clothes, you would take 
the orphan's last crust of bread out of his very mouth ; but, 
seeing I want to make a sale, I will let you have the image 
for eight annas." 

Again the buyer shakes his head resolutely: "Two 
annas, only two annas." 

"Well, you may have it for four," says the seller, but 
another resolute shake of the head sends him off for a few 
minutes. 

He has no idea of leaving, however ; you may count on 
seeing him back almost instantly, with an expression of 
injured innocence on his face, especially if there are other 
peddlers near by, saying by his looks: "Well, rob me if you 
will, take the last anna from a poor starving merchant, but 
if you will only give two annas for this beautiful image, 
why, here it is, take it, it is yours." 



THE HINDU S HOLY CITY. 



359 



Then very likely he goes off, chuckling over his bargain, 
having obtained twice as much from the unsuspecting trav- 
eler as the thing was really worth. 

Beguiled by such varied scenes as here described the 
time passes rapidly away until we come to the end of the 
first stage of our pilgrimage, the sacred city of Benares, 




EST THE MONKEY TEMPLE. 



which is also the end of their journey for many other pil- 
grims beside ourselves. 

This city on the banks of the Ganges is to the Hindu the 
holiest place in all the world, and the Holy of Holies is the 
well full of dead flowers and rice and Ganges water, which 
is worth to the devout Hindu any amount of money per tea- 
spoonful, so sacred is it in his eyes. 

The Hindus think that -Benares is 80,000 steps nearer 
heaven than any other place, and it is the Mecca of every 
devout Brahmin. Here, besides the Golden Temple, is the 



360 AT THE MINGLING OF THE SACRED STREAMS. 

great Monkey Temple, where scores of monkeys are con- 
tinually running in and out. Here, too, is the Cow Temple, 
which is only less sacred than the abode of the monkeys. 

Not many miles beyond Benares is the great city of 
Allahabad, a very important place in Central India. When 
the Hindu pilgrim first comes to Allahabad, we are told, 
he sits down on the bank of the Ganges and has his head 
shaved, holding it over the waters so that every hair may 
fall into the river, and he believes that for every hair he 
shall get a million years in heaven. So if a man is only rich 
enough to take the journey to Allahabad, and has a good 
head of hair to spare, he is sure of a very considerable time 
in Paradise. The view from the port of Allahabad is most 
extensive and interesting. Just beyond the fort is the 
juncture of the two sacred rivers, the Ganges and the 
Jumna. The Ganges flows down dark and muddy, the 
Jumna bright and sparkling, and here where they mingle 
their water is the place of places for all Hindus, the most 
sacred, except Benares, in all the world. 

Here Brahmin priests and fakirs have built their huts. 
Here the barbers ply their trade in order that the hairs may 
fall into the sacred stream and thus secure an eternity of 
bliss. Here, at the junction of the two rivers, on the vast 
plain which, in the wet season, is swept by the rushing water, 
and which is left bare when the dry season returns, a great 
fair is annually held. Once in six years it is of larger pro- 
portions than on other years, and fully a million people, it is 
said, are sometimes encamped on the banks of these sacred 
rivers. 

Here, superstition, ignorance, and ancestral traditions 
combine to fleece the pilgrims of their money, and to give to 
them for their hard cash unsubstantial promises of bliss in 
the Brahmin's heaven. Allahabad, also, is a great military 



THE MUTINY AT CAWNPORE. 361 

station for English and native soldiers, and here, best of all, 
the American missionaries, both of the Presbyterian and 
Methodist boards, have nourishing and important schools 
and churches. 

But our journey is a long one, and we must hurry on 
until we reach Cawnpore, a name forever associated with 
hideous deeds of cruelty and acts of highest heroism. Not 
only have Englishmen an historic interest in this city, but 
Americans as well have part in the traditions of the place, 
for four American missionaries with their wives and their 
children Avere among the first to suffer martyrdom in the 
great mutiny. 

As we recall the awful story of the mutiny, it will be 
remembered that for many days the little British garrison 
had defended the helpless women and children who had 
taken refuge within the fort, with great bravery and de- 
termination. But there was no great general to direct 
operations at Cawnpore. Individual courage abounded, but 
the directing mind was absent. The besiegers pressed more 
and more closely, until, at last, the garrison capitulated 
under promise of safe conduct for all the men, women, and 
children to Allahabad. 

But the treacherous villainy of the bloodthirsty Nana 
Sahib was not then known ; his promises were believed, the 
fort was surrendered, and the men, women, and children em- 
barked on boats for passage to Allahabad. No sooner were 
they well aboard before orders came from Nana to fire on 
the boats and to burn the straw thatch with which they 
were covered. 

A murderous volley was poured upon the unprotected 
boats, and of all the hundreds of soldiers and civilians who 
made up their human freight, only four escaped by swimming 
and diving and dodging the bullets until they reached the 



362 THE HOUSE OF MASSACRE. 

opposite shore. At this juncture orders came from Nana 
Sahib to save the women and children alive, after all the 
men had been killed. 

The women were crowded together in a little building, 
afterwards known as the "House of Massacre." Two hun- 
dred and one were thrown into two rooms, twenty feet by ten 
in dimensions. Here they were kept in mortal and momen- 
tary terror of their lives for a few days, until at last the 
Nana, hearing that Havelock was on his way to the rescue, 
and thinking that he would not be so eager to make the 
attack if he knew that all were dead whom he had come to 
rescue, sent his soldiers to murder the women who were 
confined in their narrow quarters. 

The soldiers would not obey his orders, and then the 
bloodthirsty wretch sent five professional butchers with 
knives and hatchets to kill these frail and beautiful English 
women and their lovely daughters. It took the butchers an 
hour and a half to finish their horrid task, and for each 
woman killed they received one rupee. Then when the 
awful massacre was completed and the clotted blood, ankle 
deep in the House of Massacre, began to ooze out under the 
doorsills, the bodies were rudely dragged out of the door 
and thrown into a well near by. 

From some of the bodies the breath of life had not yet 
departed, but all were ruthlessly thrown into the horrible 
pit. What a contrast to these scenes of blood and carnage 
is the peaceful Cawnpore of to-day! No rude alarms of 
raging foes to-day disturb the silence of the beautiful garden 
which surrounds the spot where the House of Massacre once 
stood, and the well hard by into which the bodies were 
thrown. Around the well is a tasteful stone enclosure 
several feet high, through which one enters by an iron gate- 
way into the precincts of this most melancholy and pathetic 



THE ANGEL OF REMEMBRANCE. 363 

of all spots in India, Over the well rises a beautiful white 
marble angel with outstretched wings, bearing in either 
hand a triumphant palm branch, — a beautiful design most 
beautifully executed. 

Around the mouth of the old well, beneath the marble 
angel, is the inscription in old English characters : 

"Sacreo to tbe rtfcemorg of tbe <3reat Company of Christian fl>eo= 
pie, Cbieflg TKttomen ano Cbilbren, Cruellg /iftassacveo Wear tbis 
Spot bg tbe IRebel IRana Sabib ano cTbrown, tbe Dging witb tbe 
Deao, into tbe Well JBeneatb, on tbe I5tb Dag of Julg, 1857." 

In the beautiful Memorial church which marks the spot 
where the heaviest fighting occurred before the capitulation 
of the fort, are many inscriptions which stirred my soulas I 
read them with the memory of the horrible butchery, per- 
petrated so near, fresh in mind. One of these inscriptions on 
a tablet reared by a widow in memory of her husband who 
had here lost his life, is: "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, 
saith the Lord." Another : " We reckon that the sufferings 
of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the 
glory which shall be revealed." Still another, most appro- 
priate and touching of all : " These are they which have 
come out of great tribulation." 

Only about forty miles from Cawnpore is the still more 
famous city of Lucknow, for here were gathered together in 
the "Residency," which was hastily fortified at the begin- 
ning of the mutiny by Sir Henry Lawrence, no less than 
2,242 persons, men, women, and children. Here for eighty- 
seven days, by a small handful of troops as compared with 
the tens of thousands who besieged them, they were de- 
fended, until the brave General Havelock, with his " Saints," 
who could always be relied upon for bravery in action and 
clemency in victory, relieved the place and rescued their 
countrymen. 



364 THE RESTING-PLACE OF HEROES. 

Soon after the investment of the city by the mutineers, 
the brave Lawrence, who divides with Havelock the honors 
of Lucknow, was struck by a shell, and, after two days of 
suffering, during which he directed and advised and inspired 
his troops, he died, crying out : " Never surrender. Remem- 
ber Cawnpore. Save the women and children." Here, the 
scene of his heroism, is Lawrence's fitting monument with 
the world-famed inscription upon it : 

"1bere lies one 
TOlbo trfeo to do bis out£." 

Never did man better deserve this simple but compre- 
hensive eulogy. His dying directions were carried out to 
the letter ; the brave spirit which left his body on July 4, 
1857, seemed to find a dwelling-place in every common 
soldier during the awful months of the siege. 

General Havelock's troops, which at first came to raise 
the siege, were themselves invested and beleaguered by the 
rebel Sahib's scores of thousands; but at last Sir Colin 
Campbell, with a still larger force, came to the rescue of the 
rescuers, and, under Havelock's supervision, the women and 
children were all conveyed in safety from their long im- 
prisonment and taken to Allahabad. 

Only a few days after the successful completion of this 
bravest rescue in the annals of history, the noble Havelock, 
yielding to mortal illness which had come to him in the per- 
formance of his duty, was laid low, and he is buried, not in 
"Westminster Abbey, as his bravery and devotion deserve, 
but in a lonely grave some three miles from the Residency 
which he rescued and defended. 

Seldom have I been more deeply moved than when visit- 
ing this scene of heroic and pathetic memory. The Resi- 
dency is now a mass of ruins situated in the midst of beauti- 
ful gardens ; but well preserved ruins they are, for great 



THE RUINED RESIDENCY. 



365 



pains are taken by the English government to mark and pro- 
tect every reminder of the defense and relief of Lucknow. 

Beautiful vines and creepers, all ablaze with blossoms, 
cover the ruined walls of the Kesidency. Here is the spot, 
we said to ourselves, where men and women of the same 
flesh and blood as ourselves, for weary day after weary day, 
heard the whiz of bullet and the shriek of whirring shell. 

Here was the banqueting hall transformed into a hospital, 
where hundreds of poor fellows with mangled limbs, bleed- 




MOSQTTE OF THE GREAT IMAMBARA, LUCKNOW. 

ing and dying, were brought to spend their last weary days 
under the broiling sun of tropical India. 

Here most interesting of all is the " Tyekhana," where 
the women were imprisoned during the siege. This is an 
underground cellar with lofty walls, which was deemed the 
safest place in any part of the Residency. Two hundred 
and ninety-nine women were crowded into this one cellar for 
many dreadful weeks. The fierceness of the siege and the 
way in which every exposed portion was battered by the 
sharpshooters of the Rebel Army, are well indicated in this 



366 SUFFERINGS OF IMPRISONED WOMEN. 

room of suffering and death. Only three or four very small 
windows at the top of this room admit the light and air. 
They all slope upwards and are overshaded by the projecting 
buildings overhead, so that it seems impossible for a bullet 
or a cannon-ball to find its way within this secure retreat. 
However, the battered walls show that many and many a 
shell exploded within the cellar. 

One hole is pointed out to us by the guide (an old sol- 
dier, by the way, who came to the rescue with Havelock's 
army), made by a cannon-ball which swept a baby out of its 
mother's arm without injuring the mother, while it pinned 
the bleeding, mangled remains of the little one against the 
wall near which the mother was leaning, spattering all the 
walls, as well as the mother's breast, with the baby's gore. 
No wonder that the legends of the place go on to say that 
the mother went insane. 

Another hole in the wall is shown us, made by a cannon- 
ball which whizzed so near a woman's ear that she fell dead, 
killed by fright, though unharmed by so much as a scratch 
from the ball. 

During this dreadful siege, eight or ten babies were born 
in the Tyekhana, most of whom, strange to say, lived to the 
estate of manhood and womanhood. To scores of the brave 
men who defended the Residency during that awful siege, as 
well as to Sir Henry Lawrence and Gen. Havelock, may be 
applied the thrilling verses : 

" Here rest thee, Christian warriors, rest from thy two-fold strife ; 
The battle-field of India, the battle-field of life." 

While of the two great generals and commanders who lie 
interred near by may be sung with full assurance of faith : 

" The gallant chiefs of gallant men are more than conquerors now." 
One more city we must visit before we end this most 



THE PERFECTION OF ARCHITECTURAL ART. 367 

interesting and memorable journey — the city of the Taj 
Mahal — a city justly famous for the one perfect work of 
architectural art in all the world. 

Agra, the city of the Taj, lies about a day's journey from 
Lucknow. Its chief gem is the one building that never dis- 
appoints the traveler ; the one glorious pile that fulfills every 
anticipation. The Taj bursts upon the bewildered view as a 
thing of beauty and remains a joy forever. It is not a tem- 
ple, as many people suppose, but a mausoleum built by the 
great Mogul, Shah Jehan, over his beautiful Empress 
" Moom-taj," who, by her beauty, her grace, her intellectual 
ability, and her winning ways, had obtained such power over 
the Emperor, that when she came to die she made him prom- 
ise that he would not marry again, and that he would build 
the most beautiful tomb in the world over her remains to 
perpetuate her name. 

She died in 1631, and immediately the bereaved Mogul 
set about the task of fulfilling his promise, and of building 
the wonderful tomb which is known by all the world as the 
" Taj Mahal." It is situated in the midst of a beautiful gar- 
den of palms and banyan trees, flowering shrubs and bril- 
liant creepers, fountains and marble tanks full of gold fish. 

On three sides are huge mosque-like gateways of brown 
sandstone inlaid with marble, so that one does not see the 
glories of the Taj until he enters through these massive lofty 
portals, and the magnificent building breaks at once upon 
his gaze. As the traveler beholds it first against the intense 
blue of the Indian sky, the white dome seems to be soaring 
into the sky, so light and airy is the substantial architecture. 

We were struck dumb by the beautiful spectacle, and 
dropping upon a marble seat at the very entrance of the 
gardens, we feasted our eyes upon this most splendid of 
buildings. As we enter the mausoleum, astonishment at the 



368 



MARVELOUS DECORATIONS. 



magnificence and beauty of the building gives place to 
amazement at the delicate work which is inwrought in every 
part of the structure. Polished marble and precious stones 
of every description abound and are wrought into the white 
marble both without and within. On the Empress's tomb, 
worked into figures of flowers, are all kinds of precious 
stones, bloodstones and agates, jasper and turquoise and 




THE TAJ MAHAL. 



lapis lazuli of fabulous cost. In one flower alone, in an 
obscure corner of the tomb, are thirty-five specimens of 
brilliant carnelian ; in another leaf forming a single petal of 
a carnation are twenty-three different stones. In still 
another flower are 300 different jewels formed into an exqui- 
site rose. 

., But the hand of the vandal had not been withheld even 
from this most exquisite production of the ages. Some of 
these jeweled flowers have been picked to pieces, and the 



DESECRATED BY TOURISTS. 369 

precious stones of which they were made carried away ; 
while on the small crystal windows the tourist has frequently 
cut his commonplace name. Here we find that " W. C. 
Smith " and " Jane Higginbottom " have tried to immortal- 
ize themselves. I wish that I could hold them up to perpet- 
ual ignominy for their vandalism. 

Before we leave Agra one more place claims our atten- 
tion, the palace where the beautiful queen lived. It was 
built by her husband's grandfather, but largely beautified by 
her own taste and her husband's generosity. The private 
rooms of the queen are embellished in the same way as her 
tomb. Her bathroom is called the " room of mirrors," and 
is ornamented with thousands of tiny looking-glasses. In 
the niches of the walls were placed fairy lamps over which 
water flowed in an illuminated stream to the bath beneath. 
In another part of the palace is the place where the king 
played parchesi with his twenty-four wives, sitting in the 
middle square himself, while each of his wives in a different 
colored costume, occupied one of the twenty-four squares of the 
tesselated pavement, and moved backward and forward as 
he commanded, until at last she got into the " home circle " 
which surrounded his august majesty. From this royal 
model has come the game so popular with the children of 
America. In still another part of the palace we saw the 
raised dais from which the king and his beautiful queen 
looked over the parapet into the valley beneath, where the 
elephants and tigers were compelled to fight for their delec- 
tation. Those were barbaric days in which the palace and 
the Taj were built. 

But we must not linger. Our time for the wonders of 
Northern India is exhausted, and we must hurry on to the 
seaport of Bombay, carrying with us throughout all our lives 
enduring memories of the exquisite "Jewel of Agra." 



CHAPTER XX. 



ACROSS THE INDIAN OCEAN — THROUGH THE GREAT 

DITCH. 

Some of our Fellow Passengers — Missionaries and Men of Mars — The 
Little Athletes — Potato Races and Hurdle Jumping — The Red Sea — 
A Glimpse of Sinai — "And a Half, Eight" — Waiting our Turn — A 
Huge Jack o' Lantern — A Sight Long to be Remembered — A Stu- 
pendous Enterprise — A Tarnished Name — Canal Diggers before De 
Lesseps — In the Canal — Ismalia and her Donkeys — ' ' Yankee Doodle " 
.and "Washy Washington" — Undeniable Desert — A Woman with a 
Supplementary Nose — Our First Glimpse of the Bedouin — A Family 
of Arabs — The Land of Goshen — Pharaoh and his Prime Minister — 
Bricks without Straw — The Fellahin and How They Live — Their 
Superstitions — " O, Virgin Mary" — "The Sun Do Move" — The 
Blessings Brought by John Bull — A Ghostly Reminder — How They 
Carry the Babies — "Backsheesh, Backsheesh" — "Oh Sugar for a 
Nail"— "God Will Make Them Light, Oh Lemons" — The Little 
" Sons of the River." 

E who makes the voyage across 

the Indian Ocean from Bombay 

to Ismalia has nothing of ocean 

horrors to dread, at least in the 

month of February, when it was 

our good fortune to make the 

journey. The majestic steamer 

sailed steadily on, day after day, 

over rippling blue seas, while at 

night she seemed to be cutting 

her way through wavelets of 

molten silver, so bright is the 

phosphorescence of these Eastern waters. Even the poorest 

sailor suffered no qualms of seasickness, and men, women, 

and children all enjoyed themselves in their own way, as 

their tastes and habits dictated. 

(370) 




A FROLIC ON DECK. 371 

Among our passengers were many officers of the English 
army, who were going home on a furlough, and whose ev- 
ident delight at the thought of seeing the green fields and 
cooling fogs of old England, after years on the arid plains of 
India, was as keen and fresh as that of a schoolboy on his 
way home for his Christmas holidays. Among the passen- 
gers, also, were many faithful missionaries, whose service is 
far more arduous and far less remunerative than the work 
of the men of Mars. These brave soldiers, too, deserve an 
occasional holiday, and some of them, worn and wearied 
and quite broken in health, after years of service, were going 
back for a short period of rest to their homes in America 
and England. 

It so happened that among these missionary and military 
families were many children of all ages and sizes, and a very 
happy day was given them when we all arranged for a 
series of races between the little folks, with bright rupees 
for prize money. There were straightaway races round the 
deck, in which an eager-faced little girl, not more than five 
years old, won most triumphantly, passing the line red- 
cheeked and panting, but full of gladness that she had 
beaten her older brothers and sisters, even though she was 
given a long start at the beginning. Then there were three- 
legged contests and potato races, marvelous juvenile feats in 
hurdle-jumping, and all kinds of games for all ages to partici- 
pate in. A brave major, with battle-scars seaming his face, 
was -the starter, a warlike captain was the time-keeper, and 
a heroic missionary was the judge; and it is strongly sus- 
pected that the warriors and the missionaries enjoyed the 
afternoon quite as much as the children themselves. 

After four or five days of smooth seas and pleasant 
weather the Victoria entered the Red Sea, which is so wide 
in many parts that the sensation is not that of sailing 



372 THROUGH THE RED SEA. 

through a narrow canal with land on either side, as one 
would think when studying the map, but, for the most part, 
one imagines that he is on the boundless, shoreless sea. To 
be sure, once in a while, we see some bold promontory in 
the distance or some towering mountain looming up on the 
hazy horizon, and occasionally we pass near a rocky, surf- 
beaten island ; but, until the steamer reaches the narrow 
Gulf of Suez, at the northern end of the Red Sea, there is 
but little difference between one's sensations here and upon 
the broadest ocean. In fact, the north wind, which often 
draws through this channel between the mountains quite 
fiercely, frequently makes the sea rougher than the surface 
of the neighboring Indian ocean. 

As we approached Suez the eyes of all the passengers 
were strained to catch sight of Mount Sinai, that mountain 
which more than any other on the earth's surface has 
affected the destinies of mankind ; but it is very rarely that 
one gets even a glimpse of the Mountain of the Law, for 
only on the clearest day, when the air is absolutely trans- 
parent, can it be seen from the steamer's deck. This condi- 
tion rarely prevails in these latitudes, and the captain of our 
steamer told me that only on three occasions, although he 
had sailed up and down the shores of the Red Sea for half 
his lifetime, has he caught a glimpse of the mountain that 
once quaked and smoked with fire and brimstone. 

Toward evening of a beautiful bright day in February 
we approached the low shores of Suez, and could descry the 
magnificent embankment which indicates the entrance to the 
Suez canal, that marvel of modern engineering skill. The 
channel by which the approach is made to the canal is nar- 
row, the currents are treacherous, and the water on either 
hand is shallow, so that great care must be taken by the 
larger steamers in approaching the entrance. For some 



REVELATIONS OF THE SEARCHLIGHT. 373 

time before we anchored, waiting for our turn, the quarter- 
master on either side of our steamer was casting the lead, 
and singing out in musical accents to the pilot on the bridge 
the depth of water beneath our keel. One quartermaster 
would cry out, "And a half, eight." The next instant the 
quartermaster on the other side would respond, " And a half, 
seven," showing that the water was.rapidly growing shallow 
and a fathom less was between us and the bottom than a 
moment before. Then the first quartermaster would chant, 
"And a quarter, seven," while the one on the other side, in 
a kind of antiphonal response would answer: "And three 
quarters, six." 

Thus we felt our way along, avoiding the shoals and the 
sandbanks, and then had to cast anchor for several hours, 
waiting for our turn to come to enter the great ditch. 

Night came on, and the stars came out, but even the stars 
were paled by the brilliant electric searchlight from the 
tower at the entrance of the canal, which swept around in 
every direction, bringing out every yardarm, sail, smokestack, 
and huge trumpet-like ventilator on the vessels about us, in 
startling relief. Suddenly, as we were gazing out into the 
darkness, thinking that no object was within the range of 
our vision, the great fan-like wave of light would sweep 
towards us and rest for an instant upon a full rigged vessel, 
Avhich would seem to start out of the blackness like a ghostly 
visitor. For an instant the light would play over its huge 
bulk like a vast enveloping jack-o'-lantern, and then would 
sweep on to reveal other objects beyond. 

It was a sight long to be remembered and worthy even 
of the marvelous days of the Pharaohs themselves, who were 
supposed to be versed in all the occult wonders of mystic 
lore. This ghastly white light, sweeping about, apparently 
at its own pleasure, seemingly undirected and erratic in its 

23 



374 UNION OF THE RED SEA AND THE MEDITERRANEAN. 

movements, ferreting out all things within its range, glorify- 
ing the floating seaweed and the flotsam and jetsam borne 
by the tide, as well as the huge man-of-war and leviathan 
merchant ship ; this modern miracle, I believe, would have 
astounded the miracle-workers of old with all their Egyptian 
learning. 

The 16th of November, 1869, was a day long to be re- 
membered in the history of the world, for that day witnessed 
the wedding festivities of the Ked Sea and the Mediterranean. 




IN THE SUEZ CANAL. 



On that day was inaugurated the vast enterprise of which 
the ages had dreamed and which the ingenuity and persever- 
ance of the great French engineer had made possible. 
Nearly one hundred million dollars had the canal cost ; and 
it is said that the Khedive spent no less than twenty millions 
of dollars in the ceremonies of the inauguration. 

It will be readily seen of what inestimable value the 
canal is to the commercial world, when we remember that it 
reduces the distance from London to Bombay from 12,500 
to 7,000 miles, a saving of nearly one-half. From London 



THE FIRST WATERWAY BETWEEN THE TWO OCEANS. 375 

to Hong Kong the distance is over 15,000 miles by the Cape 
of Good Hope, and only 11,000 miles by the canal ; while 
from Marseilles to Bombay, the distance by the Cape is over 
12,000 miles, by the canal only 5,000, a saving of nearly 
sixty per cent. But not only is the canal a stupendous and 
successful enterprise from a commercial point of view, but it 
is as successful financially as in every other aspect. The 
tolls amount to many millions of dollars every year, and are 
constantly increasing. 

But it must not be thought that in the nineteenth cen- 
tury was first conceived the project of a waterway between 
the two oceans, or that De Lesseps' fertile brain was the first 
to evolve this gigantic scheme. From the very earliest 
days there was an overland route between the Mediterra- 
nean and the Red Sea, but it is said that Sethi I, the great 
prince of the nineteenth Egyptian dynasty, desirous of trans- 
porting his navies from one sea to the other, built the first 
canal. A representation of his time on the wall of the ban- 
quet hall of Karnac, tells us that on his victorious return 
from Egypt the conqueror traversed a canal, swarming with 
crocodiles and defended by bastions. 

But Father Time has a great fashion of defacing and de- 
stroying the mighty works of man. If with his tooth he 
can gnaw away the pyramids, he has little difficulty in fill- 
ing up a ditch, however vast it may be, or however impor- 
tant to the commerce of the world. And so it came about, 
as the centuries went on, and lesser men occupied the throne 
of the Pharaohs, and the people relapsed into commercial in- 
difference, that this canal was obliterated, and even its 
course cannot be discovered to-day. 

But eight hundred years after the Pharaoh who built the 
first canal, came Pharaoh Nekho, who was very desirous for 
the welfare of his country. He began to construct a canal 



376 ANCIENT CANALS, EGYPTIAN, PERSIAN, AND ROMAN. 

between the Nile and the Red Sea, and it is said that no less 
than 120,000 Egyptians perished while engaged in this work. 
It was afterwards abandoned, because the oracle told Pha- 
raoh that the barbarians alone would profit by the work. 
However, the work already accomplished, and the lives 
lost, did not go altogether for nothing, for the canal was 
completed by Darius, the great founder of the Persian 
Empire, the same Darius of whom we read in the Book of 
Daniel, who has left in many ways the impress of his mighty 
personality upon the world. 

Even as late as the century immediately before the 
Christian era, there is no doubt that the remains of this old 
canal were still found, for history tells us that after the battle 
of Actium, Cleopatra made an effort to convey her ships 
across the Isthmus of Suez, in order to escape with her treas- 
ures from Octavius. If there had been no canal, she would 
not have been foolish enough to try to transport her ships 
over the land, though it is probable, as the historians tell us, 
that the canal was in a very dilapidated condition. 

Afterwards, it is said that the Romans, and later still, the 
Arabs, reconstructed the old canal or dug a new one; but the 
only thing that seems to be certain about this vast hole in 
the ground is, that it became unserviceable after the eighth 
century, and for a thousand years the merchants toilsomely 
sent their vessels around the Cape of Good Hope, until De 
Lesseps proved the feasibility of the present canal, the possi- 
bility of its construction, and with unbounded faith and 
energy overcame the countless obstacles which lay between 
him and triumphant success. 

But during all this time our vessel has been anchored 
near the entrance of the canal, waiting for the signal to be 
given that the channel is clear, and that it is our turn to 
enter. At last it comes, and, weighing anchor, stealthily 



THROUGH THE GREAT DITCH. 



377 



and slowly, the great ship swings within the breakwater 
which defends the mouth of the canal, and very slowly feels 
its way between the sandy banks that stretch away on either 
side. The great ditch is twenty-five feet wide at the bot- 
tom, while on the surface it is much wider, and sometimes 
stretches out into broad natural lakes, which saved the con- 
structors of the canal much digging on their way from sea 
to sea. There is very little of special interest in the journey 
to Ismalia. 
It takes 
about eight 
hours time, 
so slowly do 
the steamers 
proceed, lest 
the wash of 
waves which 
they create 
should de- 
stroy the 
banks. But 
at last in the 
early morn- 
ing light, the 
little modern 
town where 

we are to leave our floating home comes in sight, and a 
steam launch soon bears us to the shore. 

There is almost nothing to see in Ismalia except the 
donkeys and the donkey boys. The latter are ubiquitous 
and most persistent. They meet you at the landing; they 
thrust their donkey in your face and eyes as soon as you 
step ashore. They plant him before you, broadside on, to 




DONKEY BOY OF ISMALIA. 



378 "YANKEE DOODLE*' AND " WASHY-WASHINGTON." 

bar your further progress, unless you mount and ride. 
They sound his praises in every note of the gamut. After 
all other recommendations fail, they plead with you to take 
him because of his "lovely black eyes." One boy even rec- 
ommended his donkey to us as a "riglar masher." If they 
suspect you of being an American, they will cry out, " Take 
my donkey, Master," "My donkey is Yankee Doodle," "My 
donkey's name is Washington," while one boy gravely as- 
sured us, thinking that he surely would secure our patronage 
thereby, that his animal rejoiced in the name of "Washy- 
Washington." 

We tarry in Ismalia no longer than is absolutely nec- 
essary, for stranger sights lure us on to the City of the 
Califs. 

Taking the railway at Ismalia, a journey of a few hours 
brings us to the ancient city of Cairo. The first part of the 
way lies through the desert, and a most uncompromising 
and undeniable desert it is. The yellow sand hems in the 
narrow railway track on every side, and there is scarcely a 
green thing far or near to refresh the eyes. Still, barren as 
is the country, its people are of never-failing interest. 
Every railway station is bright with the colors of the curious 
costumes of men and women. Here is an orange seller, for 
instance, with her face entirely covered by a hideous black 
veil, with only a slit large enough for two piercing black 
eyes to shine through. Over her nose is a curious brass 
contrivance like a great supplementary nose, which seems to 
attach the veil to the upper part of the headdress. Here- is 
another woman with a heavy water jar on her head, which 
she carries, standing proudly erect, in a way that shows 
that she has been used to such burdens from her earliest 
girlhood. At another station we see a whole family of 
Arabs squatting upon the platform, the women veiled as 



GREEN FIELDS AND WAVING PALMS. 



379 



those we have already described, though the little girls are 
allowed to go with uncovered faces. For the most part, 
they are a stupid, degraded lot of human beings, with noth- 
ing of aspiration in their eyes, and no desire to be anything 
but the hewers of wood and the drawers of water which 
they and their ancestors have been for so many centuries. 

After a few miles of this desert journey, we grow rather 
listless and indifferent to that which may be seen outside the 




ON THE BANKS OP THE NILE. 

car window, but suddenly we are aroused from our indiffer- 
ence by an entrancing sight of green fields and fertile gar- 
dens and waving palm trees. It is as though we had come 
into a fairy land, out of a very prosaic workaday world. 
And indeed we have entered fairy land, and the magician 
that works the wonder is none other than old Father Nile. 
He sends out his life-giving waters, and whatever he touches 
springs into new life and blossoms like the rose. The line of 
demarcation between the desert and the well-favored lands 



380 IN THE LAND OF JOSEPH AND MOSES. 

of the Nile is clear and distinct ; one moment the train is in 
the arid purgatory of the desert, the next it is in the smiling 
paradise of the oasis. 

And this first fertile tract to which we have come is none 
other than the Goshen of the Bible. No wonder that the 
aged Jacob rejoiced when his long pilgrimage was over and 
he entered into this fair land. We can understand better 
than ever before the great power that Joseph must have en- 
joyed to be able to secure this goodly land for his father and 
his unbrotherly brothers. 

Off in the distance, but a little way from the railway 
track, are the fields where the Israelites made bricks without 
straw, and perhaps our eye rests upon the very place where 
Moses, rendered indignant beyond the power of control at 
the cruelties which were heaped upon his suffering fellow 
countrymen, slew the Egyptian, and became an exile from 
the court where he might have reigned as a prince, "choos- 
ing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to 
enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season." Our hearts throb 
within us as we look out on these historic sights, and realize 
that these were the same sandy plains, the same green fields, 
watered then as now, "with the tears of the Nile," while the 
same cloudless Egyptian sky bent over them as over us. 
Out here rode in majestic state the famous Prime Minister 
of the Pharaohs, the young man who, by his own virtue and 
force of character, raised himself from the position of a 
captive peasant to a prince of the realm. These roads, too, 
were trodden by the feet of Aaron, the High Priest, by 
Miriam, the tuneful singer ; and along these same highways 
rumbled the chariot wheels of the great Pharaohs, who, as 
world-conquering rulers, have never been equaled by Greek 
or Roman, Turk or Briton. 

We see very little, however, to remind us of the magnifi- 




fe **! 



THE EGYPTIANS OF TO-DAY. 383 

cence of the Pharaohs, or of the state in which Joseph trav- 
eled in those early days. Most of the villages which we 
pass are mean collections of wretched mud houses. Their 
four walls rise scarcely higher than the head of a man, and 
except for an occasional mosque, with its slender minaret, 
there is no attempt at architectural beauty or embellishment 
of any kind. Most of the lower classes who swarm at the 
railway stations, and whom we see from the car windows, 
wear around their necks charms, written on paper, and sewn 
up in leather. They are ignorant and superstitious to the 
last degree, and not only protect themselves, but their cattle 
in the same way. Every man, as he passes a saint's tomb, it 
is said, mumbles a prayer without stopping, and, saints' 
tombs being very numerous, a mumbled prayer is always on 
his lips. Some of the great saints are appealed to on every 
possible occasion. If a man sneezes, or is afflicted with the 
hiccoughs, or turns his ankle in the streets, he adjures his 
favorite saint. Even if his legs are stiff as he rises from his 
seat, he exclaims, " O Virgin Mary ! " Their ignorance is 
beyond all comprehension, the education even of the upper 
classes being confined to the narrow limits of the Koran. 
Not one of them can be convinced that the earth is not flat, 
while they agree thoroughly with Parson Jasper in his dic- 
tum that " the sun do move." 

An Egyptian school is a curiosity. The pupils sit on the 
floor, study their lessons aloud, rocking back and forth, and 
they make the schoolroom about as noisy as a ward political 
meeting. I generally knew where a schoolroom was at least 
half a minute before I reached its doors. The master squats 
on the floor, or stands among his pupils, who are seated in 
rows or promiscuously scattered through the apartment. 
Their lessons are given to them upon slates or large cards, 
and they sit rocking back and forth and studying aloud. 



384 THE DESPISED EUROPEANS. 

A learned priest, which means a man learned in the mys- 
teries of the Koran, indignantly walked out of an examina- 
tion hall in Cairo recently, when told that the scholars were 
there taught that the earth was round. No such heresy 
would he allow to have place even for a moment in his the- 
ology. Every other man is to a Mohammedan an infidel ; 
and not only an infidel, but a miserable and despicable infi- 
del, at that, who deserves stoning and torture and death, 
though the laws unjustly interfere in his behalf. Even the 
children will greet the Europeans on the street with the 
exclamation : " Ya Nusram ! " (O Nazarene). The donkey 
boy calls out to his ass, as he prods him with a sharp stick : 
" Go along, you son of a pig, get on, you son of a Nazarene ! " 

It is said by those who have lived long in Egypt, that the 
centuries of oppression under hard task masters, and the 
subserviency to a false and degrading religion, have not only 
dulled the moral and intellectual faculties of the Egyptians, 
but have deadened even their physical senses as well. A 
traveler and resident for ten years in Egypt says that the 
sense of pain is very small among the lower classes, that their 
olfactory nerves are also extremely dull, that they cannot 
distinguish one person from another by his footsteps, and 
not easily by his voice, and that they never hear a slight or 
distant sound, or notice a whisper. 

In the interior of the poor houses, whose outer walls we 
see from the train, is no furniture worthy of the name. A 
few mats, a sheepskin, a basket or two, kettles for heating 
water, and a small array of wooden dishes, is all that we 
find within the hut, and this hut is shared by the hens and 
the ducks, the goats, and the sheep of the establishment, as 
well as by the human inhabitants, while the cows and buffa- 
loes would have no hesitation in pushing their way within 
the doors, were they wide enough to receive them. 



FOOD OF THE LOWER CLASSES. 385 

Almost the only food of the laboring classes is a kind of 
bread made of sorghum flour or of Indian corn, wheaten 
bread being eaten only by the wealthy classes. For supper, 
however, we are told, even the poorest .cause a hot repast to 
be prepared. This usually consists of a highly salted sauce 
made of onions and butter, or, in the poorer houses, of butter 

and linseed oil. 

t 

Around the low table the various members of the family 
sit, while each member dips his piece of bread, held in his 
fingers, into this common family sauce. In addition to this, 
buffaloes' and goats' milk, and in the summer, cucumbers and 
pumpkins are the only addition. Of course, this meagre bill 
of fare and this wretched manner of life applies to the 
lower classes only. There is an aristocracy in Egypt, as 
there is everywhere else, that clothes itself in purple and fine 
linen and lives upon the fat of the land. But the poverty of 
the masses is almost beyond description. 

Poor as it is, the common people of Egypt were probably 
never so well off as they are to-day. From the time of the 
Israelites they have lived the lives of serfs. Oppressed by 
the original Pharaohs, doubly oppressed by each succeeding 
dynasty, their lives held cheaper than the very dirt of the 
street, hundreds of thousands of them sacrificed in the dig- 
ging of every great canal and the building of every gigantic 
pyramid ; it is only within the memory of the present gener- 
ation that attention has been called to the wretched con- 
dition of the Fellahin, and that anything has been done for 
their relief. Since the English have acquired a dominating 
control in Egypt, their beneficent rule has been felt as in 
other Eastern lands. Order has come out of chaos, justice 
has succeeded to tyranny, and theoretically, at least, the 
tiller of the soil can assert his rights as well as the proudest 
descendant of the Pharaohs. As a matter of fact, there 



38G DISTINGUISHING COLOR OF THE TURBAN. 

is doubtless still very much of oppression and iniquitous 
taxation, for the work of centuries cannot be undone in a 
moment, or the rights of a people secured by a single decree. 
However, Egypt is on the high road to recovery. Every 
succeeding year sees a better state of affairs in the land of 
the Nile, and the common people, at least, should devoutly 
give thanks for the interference of John Bull and his red- 
coats. 

But among our fellow-passengers are many others be- 
sides the Fellahin of the Nile. There are grave Mohamme- 
dan dignitaries. Some of these Moslems wear green 
turbans, showing that they are descendants of the great 
prophet himself, for no others are allowed to wear this 
color. The scholars wear a broad, evenly-folded turban of a 
light color, and it is said that the orthodox length of a 
believer's turban is seven times that of his head, being 
equivalent to the whole length of his body, in order that the 
turban may afterwards be used as the wearer's winding- 
sheet, and that this thought may familiarize him with the 
prospect of death. 

The Copts, some of whom we also see among our fellow- 
passengers, or among the loungers at the railway station, 
wear a dark blue turban, and the Jews a turban of yellow, 
since these were the colors decreed in the fourteenth cen- 
tury. 

One of the most characteristic things of any country is 
the way in which the children are carried. As may well be 
believed, such luxuries as baby carriages are unknown in the 
East. In China and Japan the babies are strapped upon 
the backs of their mothers ; in India they are carried upon 
their thighs; while in Egypt they are perched upon their 
mother's shoulders, the little legs hanging down before and 
behind, while they lean over on their mother's head, and 



CLAIMANTS FOR CHARITY. 38? 

frequently go to sleep in this seemingly uncomfortable 
position. 

Of course beggars are very common. You cannot step 
off the railway trains, or into the mosques, or turn the 
corner of the streets, without being besieged by some new 
claimant for charity. Thin, scrawny, diseased hands are 
thrust into your face at every turn, and your loathing re- 
pugnance is more often excited than pity, by the horrible 
specimens of humanity that dog every footstep. Men with 
noses and chins eaten away by cancer, with eyes sealed and 
corroded by countless sores, with finger joints twisted and 
gnarled by rheumatism, or with handless stumps gradually 
being eaten away by leprosy, confront us at every turn until 
one has to harden himself against these sights, or else flee 
incontinently within doors, and lock himself away from all 
his fellow-men. 

Instead of politely saying good morning to the passing 
stranger, the beggar cries out to every European, "Back- 
sheesh, backsheesh ! " (A gift, a gift.) The wise traveler 
responds to all such salutations, " Ma fish, ma fish ! " (I have 
nothing for you). Or, if he wishes to vary the formula, he 
will say, " Allah yatik " (May God give thee). This often 
answers in place of backsheesh, and the beggar will go away 
quite as contented as if he had received what he asked for. 

A very common sight in the great cities, as well as in the 
smaller towns, is the water carrier with his goat-skin of 
water, which looks like the great bloated carcass of an 
animal carried on his back. He still plies his trade in the 
city of Cairo, although the city is well supplied with water 
from the new water-works. Still, he passes along the street, 
w T ith his heavy goat-skin on his shoulders, crying out at the 
top of his lungs, " Ya auwad Allah ! " (May God recompense 
me). Nevertheless, notwithstanding his pious cry, he will 



388 



DISPENSING THE DRINK OFFERING. 



be very much disappointed if any one took a draft from his 
goat-skin and left all the recompense to Allah. 

On feast days, especially the birthdays of the saints, 
pious Moslems, desirous of securing an easy entrance into 
paradise, frequently hire one of these water carriers to 
supply all comers with water gratuitously. Then the water 
carrier shouts in a loud tone, "Sebil Allah ya' atshan ya 
moyeh ! " In this way he invites all to drink freely, but he 
is very careful to turn to his employer, who usually stands 




■WATER-CARRIERS FILLING THEIR GOAT SKINS. 

near him with a good deal of ostentation, saying, " God for- 
give thy sins, oh dispenser of the drink offering, God have 
mercy on thy parents ! " To which they who are partaking 
of the water reply, "Amen. God have mercy on them and 
on us." After numerous blessings of a similar kind have 
been interchanged, the sakka hands the last cup of water 
to his employer with the words : " The remainder for the 
liberal men, and paradise for the confessor of the unity. God 
bless thee, thou dispenser of the drink offering." 



STREET CRIES OF THE ORIENT. 389 

Many of the other cries that one hears in the street or in 
the railway station are equally curious. The cry of the 
orange merchant and the itinerant fish peddler at home are 
quite unintelligible, though spoken in one's own language, 
and it can easily be imagined that the street cries of Egypt are 
quite beyond the comprehension of the passing tourist. So, 
without shame, we must confess that we have consulted our 
guide book at this point for the interpretation of these cries. 

There is a man with a thin jelly made of starch and 
sugar. He is crying out, " O sugar for a nail, O confec- 
tion ! " which unintelligible cry indicates that he is willing 
to barter his jelly for a nail or piece of old iron. 

There is a vender of lemons, who calls out to us as we 
pass by, " God will make them light, O lemons ! " "We turn 
to Baedeker to find that he means to say, in his highly 
figurative and poetic language, that God will help him to 
sell his lemons, and thus make his baskets light. 

Another long cry of twenty syllables rings out on the air, 
which, being interpreted, reads as follows : " Help, O help, 
the lupins of Embabeh are better than almonds! O how 
sweet is the little son of the river ! " This cry, too, must be 
interpreted, when we find that it means that the peas which 
this vender has to sell require to be soaked in river water 
some time before they are boiled. On this account they are 
called " Sons of the river," and their praises are thus sung 
by this poetical child of the desert. 

By these various sights and sounds and cries of street 
vender and beggar, we are welcomed to Cairo, the magic 
city of the Orient, and find ourselves in the country of the 
Arabian nights, the capital city of the Cailifs. 



CHAPTER XXL 

IN THE LAND OF THE PHARAOHS — THE MOST WONDER- 
FUL MUSEUM IN THE WORLD — THE MUMMY OF PHA- 
RAOH THE OPPRESSOR, AND HOW THE BODY WAS DIS- 
COVERED—LOOKING INTO PHARAOH'S FACE. 

Marvelous Cairo — A Vivacious Traveler — Eyes wanted Before and Be- 
hind — Fashion in a Fez — Madam Grundy in Egypt — At the Sugar 
Cane Bazaar — A Glimpse of the Khedive — A Boy in a Fez — The 
Flight into Egypt — The Tree of the Virgin — How the Spider Out- 
witted Herod — The Only Relic — Joseph's Father-in-Law — Where 
Joseph was Married — The Most Wonderful Museum in the World — 
A Room Full of Mummies — Moses' Playfellow — What the Bible says 
of Him — A Mummy over Three Thousand Years Old — The Pharaoh 
of the Oppression — Where He was Buried — The Location a Mighty 
Secret for Centuries — How the Tomb was Discovered — Unwinding 
the Mummy — How Pharaoh Looked — Description of the Body — Its 
Identity Established — Where is the Pharaoh of the Exodus ? 




IE who travels around the world 
is apt to become somewhat sated 
with wonders before he reaches 
Egypt. The glories of Japan, 
the wonders of China, the ancient 
magnificence of India, in some 
degree exhaust his capacity for 
sight-seeing; his mind becomes 
glutted with marvelous memo- 
ries, and it requires a place of 
unusual interest to arouse his 
somewhat flagging enthusiasm. 
But Cairo is such a place. Coming to it from the East 
or the West, its strange charm is always felt. No traveler 
can be so Uase as not to acknowledge the magic of this mar- 
velous city. The strange people, the curious costumes, the 

(300) 




WJfm 









IN THE STREETS OF CAIRO. 



393 



mingling of the Occident and the Orient, the unfamiliar 
cries in the street, the characteristic crowd of all sorts and 
conditions of men in front of each cbflfee house, the strange 
manners and customs of the bazaar, all furnish material 
for days of delight in the capital of Egypt. Before we go 




STREET MUSICIANS AND DANCERS OF CAIRO. 

out of the city to see the more marvelous wonders beyond — 
the pyramids and the sphinx, which alone of all the crea 
tions of man have defied the ravages of centuries — let us 
spend a little while within the city itself. 

Cairo has been compared by a vivacious writer to a 
mosaic of the most fantastic and bizarre description, in which 
all nations, customs, and epochs are represented, a living 
museum of all imaginable and unimaginable phases of exist- 

24 



594 



VIGOROUS AIDS TO LOCOMOTION. 



ence, of refinement and degeneracy, of civilization and bar- 
barism, of knowledge and ignorance, of paganism, Christian- 
ity, and Mohammedanism. " In the boulevards of Paris, 
and on London bridge," says one, " I saw but the shadow, 
and at Alexandria heard only the prelude of the babel of 

Cairo, to which the Roman or 
Yenetian carnival is tame and 
commonplace." 

In order to enjoy these 
things thoroughly, one desires 
eyes behind as well as before, 
and the steady power of forc- 
ing one's way possessed by the 
camel. However, as a camel 
is a bulk too huge for these 
narrow streets, we will hire a 
donkey, with which, and the 
help of a vigorous and viva- 
cious boy behind to prod him 
with a sharp stick, and tAvist 
his tail occasionally (a means 
of urging to locomotion which 
we cannot altogether prevent, 
although we are sure that the 
Society for the Prevention of 
Cruelty to Animals would dis- 
approve), we can manage to get through the crowd. 

The experience of the traveler, Goltz, is so graphically 
told, and so true to the experience of many another traveler 
in Cairo, that I cannot help quoting a paragraph from his 
pleasant description. " Having carefully learned the ex- 
pressions ' ana' a wiz humar ' (I want a donkey) and ' bikan 
kirsh deh ' (how many piasters ? ), I yielded to the temptations 




PRAYING IN THE STREETS OF CAIRO. 



THE DONKEY BOYS OF CAIRO. 



395 



of plunging recklessly into the thick of Arabian life, its con- 
versation and its equestrianism. I therefore pronounced the 
mystic words with the satisfaction of a child which utters 
articulate expressions for the first time, when I was instantly 
so perfectly understood by a score of donkey boys that they 
all offered me their donkeys at once ; though perhaps they 
would have done so had I ^/J^ JljN 



not spoken at all. I felt 
like a magician who has 
succeeded in discovering 
an effectual formula of 
conjuration. After this 
display of my abilities, I 
vaulted into the saddle 
with as much ease and 
assurance as if Cairo had 
been my home. The don- 
key boy then probably 
asked me ' Where to % ' 
whereupon, feeling that 
my stock of Arabic phrases 
and cabalistic f ormluse was 
nearly exhausted, I replied 
in a very abbreviated 
form: 'Kullo, Kullo' 
(everything), meaning 
that I wanted to see everything. 




LATTICED WINDOWS — CAIRO. 



The donkey boy then 
nodded to this, 'All right, I understand,' and I now felt 
perfect confidence in my powers of speech. 

" My donkey now set off at a gallop and plunged into 
the midst of a labyrinth of lanes full of riders and walkers, 
but where I was going, or how far, or why, I was unable to 
tell. That, however, was precisely the joke of the thing." 



396 FASHIONS IN FEZZES. 

It is altogether probable, however, that our wide-awake 
traveler found himself before long in the bazaars, for the 
donkey boys have a secret understanding with the proprie- 
tors of these bazaars that they shall bring every unsuspect- 
ing traveler within their web as soon as possible. So pictur- 
esque is the sight that the traveler is usually quite ready to 
be caught, even though it means that he will be despoiled of 
a few francs, and have very little to show for them. 

"We passed through one street which seemed to be very 
largely given up to the fez makers. Here is the universal head 
covering of the Turk in all stages of manufacture. New 
fezzes are being shaped, and old fezzes are being re-ironed, 
just as silk hats are put into good condition in the hat shops 
of other countries. A truncated cone of brass is the mould 
on which the fez is built, and since scarcely any other kind 
of head gear is used in this or any other part of the Moham- 
medan world, it will be seen that these little factories trans- 
act a very large business. In fact, the fez is the sign of 
national subjection to the Turk, and Christians and Jews in 
Turkish lands were originally obliged to wear it, if I mistake 
not, on pain of being treated as heretics and traitors. In 
these days the servitude expressed by the fez is largely for- 
gotten, and in church and on the street, in the mosque and 
in the parlors, in the railway train and on the house-top, 
wherever one sees a subject of the Sultan, or am^one belong- 
ing to a tributary nation, he will, doubtless, see his head 
covered with the red, conical cap, with the black tassel hang- 
ing down behind. 

It would seem that there could not be much difference in 
fezzes, that there was very little scope for the fashionable 
hatters in this style of head gear ; but human nature is very 
much the same in all lands, and there is a chance for Dame 
Fashion to exercise her powers, and for Madame Grundy to 



A CHANCE FOR MADAME GRUNDY. 



397 



make her remarks even upon fezzes. To the unpracticed 
eye they all look alike, but some are a little higher than 
others, as we shall find if we look closely ; some are of a 
darker shade of red ; others come more nearly to a point at 
the top; and just as one funereal silk hat differs from an- 




SUGAR-CANE AND FRUIT SELLERS OP CAIRO. 

other funereal silk hat in its solemn lines of ugliness, so one 
fez differs from another, and the changing fashion makes the 
fez-makers' business good. 

Beyond this fez merchant is the sugar-cane bazaar, where, 
leaning up against the sides of the building, we see stacks of 
tall canes from which jointed sections are cut off for any 



398 A PEEP AT THE KHEDIVE. 

passing customer. The small boy, as can be easily imagined, 
especially enjoys this succulent, sugary product, and he may 
be seen at almost any of these numberless stalls trying to 
get the very largest possible piece of sugar-cane for the 
smallest possible piece of money. 

A veiled beauty (we will give her the benefit of the 
doubt), with numerous strings of huge beads around her 
neck, is waiting on the small boy, and very likely in the 
foreground is a thick-lipped, woolly-pated Nubian, who in 
his rags and dirt will lie out in the sun all day long, with 
never a thought that it is uncomfortably warm. 

As we were looking in at one of these shops, we saw an 
unusual commotion taking place in the street beyond us. 
People were hurrying to shop doors, and scurrying from the 
side streets to the corner of the larger thoroughfare, as 
though some unusual sight was about to be exhibited. We 
could not understand the meaning of the commotion until 
our donkey boy pulled us excitedly by the sleeve, and, point- 
ing to 4he street, said something about the Khedive, which 
gave us to understand that this youthful successor of the 
Pharaohs was about to pass. 

Our surmise concerning the donkey boy's information 
was correct, and very soon four or five soldiers dashed by, 
followed by an open carriage drawn by a span of splendid 
horses. In this carriage were two men of very ordinary ap- 
pearance, one much older than the other. Both wore red 
fezzes of the ordinary type, but otherwise were dressed as 
European gentlemen. The younger of these two was the 
boyish Khedive of Egypt, the ruler whose predecessors five 
thousand years ago built the pyramids and dug the ancient 
canals, and erected the most magnificent monuments which 
the world has ever seen, monuments which even time and 
vandalism cannot destroy. 



A STROLL THROUGH THE BAZAARS. 



399 



Going on from this bazaar, from ivhose doorway we have 
watched the passing of the Khedive, we soon enter a perfect 
labyrinth of passageways, lined on every hand with little 
stalls where every imaginable article, and a good many 
things which until recently have been unimaginable to us, 
are sold: brass ware and silver filagree work, amber and 
sandal wood, fish and vegetables, 
fruit and statuettes, donkey bells 
and evil-eye beads for the camels, 
cakes and sugar for the boys, fod- 
der for the donkeys, saddles for 
the horses, veils for the women, 
earrings and gewgaws for the 
Arabs of the desert, and every- 
thing which Eastern and "Western 
ideas have rendered necessary. 

Many of these bazaars open out 
of passageways that are entirely 
covered overhead, and are dark, 
gloomy recesses into which a ray 
of sunlight never struggles. Still, 
dirty and dark, vermin-infested 
and beggar-haunted as they are, 
they are extremely interesting, 
and in their mazes any one who 
delights in the study of human nature can lose himself for 
days at a time, but never lose his interest in the strange 
sights around him. 

Before leaving this fascinating city there are three ex- 
cursions which we must make, — one to Heliopolis where 
Joseph lived, another to the marvelous museums of Bulak, 
the most remarkable depository of antiquities in all the 
world, and the third to the pyramids of Gizeh. 




SHOE PEDDLER OF CAIRO. 



400 TRADITIONS OF THE PAST. 

We can visit Heliopolis in a single half day. A pleasant 
road, winding oftentimes between gardens of oranges and 
lemons, and shaded much of the way by these fragrant 
trees, takes us to this famous City of the Sun. On the way 
we pass the village of Matariyeh. Here is the tree and well 
of the Virgin. My readers, who are acquainted with their 
JS"ew Testament history, will remember that the mother of 
our Lord, to escape the cruel persecutions of Herod, fled into 
Egypt with the* child Jesus and her husband Joseph. The 
pathetic picture which is so common in Christian art of the 
Flight into Egypt, has done scarcely less than the Bible 
itself to impress this scene upon the imagination of the 
world. Those who have once seen this picture, or any of 
the innumerable copies of it, will never forget the sweet 
face of the Yirgin Mother, as she rides along the dusty road, 
bearing the infant Jesus in her arms, while the dignified and 
manly Joseph walks by their side. 

A modern traveler has said that if Joseph and Mary 
were modern Bedouins, Joseph would be riding the ass, 
while Mary would walk and carry the child. But we are 
glad to believe that Joseph and Mary had very little in 
common with the modern Bedouin, and that the western 
ideas of respect to motherhood and womankind prevailed in 
that journey undertaken so long ago to the land of Egypt. 
In this little village to which we have come, tradition says 
the virgin and child once rested, and the tree under which 
she rested — a large, spreading sycamore, with decayed 
trunk and gnarled limbs — is still pointed out. Of course, 
■even the most credulous know that this particular tree must 
have been planted many centuries after that famous journey 
was undertaken ; but it is very certain that a most ancient 
tradition connects the Holy Family with this very spot, and 
though it is known that this tree was not planted until 1672, 



AN INTERESTING TREE AND ITS STORY. 



401 



and that its predecessor died in 1665, it is not by any means 
impossible that near this spot came the Blessed Mother and 
the Holy Child, with their stalwart protector, from the land 
of Judea. 




A BEDOUIN FAMILY ON A JOURNEY. 



The water for the garden in which the tree is planted 
comes from a shallow pool near by, and, as we visited the 
spot, a blindfolded ox was pacing his weary round, raising 
the water by a series of endless buckets, which poured 
their contents into the ditches that irrigated the garden. 
Unlike most of the water in this vicinity, which is brackish, 



402 a spider's veil and what it concealed. 

the water from this reservoir is sweet and good for drinking, 
and before we left the garden we took a draught from the 
same pool at which the Virgin and her husband may have 
quenched their thirst eighteen hundred years ago. 

Tradition has been busy with this place, as with every 
other that is connected with the Holy Family, and one 
pretty legend tells us that when persecution was rife, the 
mother concealed herself with the child in the hollow trunk 
of the tree which stood on this spot, and that a spicier wove 
its web so closely across the opening that no lynx-eyed per- 
secutor could see the mother and the child beneath the 
spider's veil. 

Half a mile beyond this garden we see all that is left of 
the famous Heliopolis, or the City of the Sun. This is the 
place which the Bible calls On, and here we are told that 
Pharaoh gave Joseph the daughter of a priest of Heliopolis 
in marriage. In early days the Temple of the Sun at Helio- 
polis was the most famous sacred place in all Egypt, and was 
the scene of the most notable ceremonies connected with the 
worship of the sun. No less than 12,913 priests and officials, 
were connected with this temple, it is said. As one thinks 
of the former magnificence of this spot and contrasts it with 
its present decay, he realizes how absolutely Time destroys 
the mightiest works of man. 

Few places have been so utterly wiped out of existence. 
All that is left now of this famous temple is a single 
obelisk, and even that is not impressive, for it is half 
buried in the accumulated mud and soil of the centuries, 
which have been deposited around it. On two sides the bees 
have built their cells in the deep-cut hieroglyphics, so as to 
fill them up completely and obliterate the characters, and 
the only signs of life about this temple, which once swarmed 
with thousands of priests and myriads of worshipers, are two 



THE RAVAGES OP TIME. 403 

or three blind, lame, halt, and loathsome beggars, who limp 
after one at every step, and hold out filthy hands, distorted 
and twisted by disease, for backsheesh. 

Companion obelisks to the one which stands here have 
been taken by successive conquerors of Egypt to grace their 
capitals, and this alone is left to tell the tale of the glory of 
Heliopolis. On this obelisk, doubtless, Joseph looked; 
beneath the shadows of this monument and its tall com- 
panions he led the Mother and Child. To the temple, which 
stood on this spot in its more than royal magnificence, came 
the Pharaohs, one after another. Every Pharaoh considered 
himself the human embodiment of the sun, and it is only 
natural that he should have brought offerings worthy of a 
Pharaoh to this magnificent temple, to increase with every 
reign of every dynasty its growing magnificence. 

There is to-day in the National Museum at London a 
papyrus which gives a marvelous list of presents donated to 
this temple by Rameses III alone. But now, for more than 
two thousand years, Heliopolis has been but a name. Even 
the famous university which once flourished here, though es- 
tablished long after the temple had ceased to exist, and only a 
hundred years before the time of Christ, is utterly obliterated. 
Nations have come and gone, kingdoms have waxed and 
waned, steadily the star of empire has moved westward, but 
this one lonely monolith remains, half imbedded in mud, 
not even respected by the bees themselves, resorted to by 
only a few tourists, on whom beggars fatten — this only 
remains of the magnificent City of the Sun. 

Our next excursion shall be to the Bulak Museum. As a 
rule, the traveler finds a museum a tiresome w T eariness to the 
flesh, unless he is engaged in some particular branch of 
research and desires to make use of the treasures which the 
museum contains, in his particular investigations ; he is apt 



404 



A WONDERFUL MUSEUM. 



to wander through the endless corridors in a stupid and per- 
functory way, casting a glance to the right and the left, for 
the sake of performing his duty, and being able to say that 
he has " done " the museum. Eye and brain, as well as feet 
become tired, the confined atmosphere at last becomes unen- 
durable, and one vows that he will see no more curiosities 
" while the world standeth," if they are to be bought at the 
expense of such utter weariness and ennui. Then, as one 




IN THE BULAK MUSEUM. 



emerges into the open air, he has a dim remembrance of a 
tomb here and a scarabeus there, of a collection of arrow 
heads over yonder, of a case of butterflies on the north wall, 
and another of ancient coins on the south wall. But where 
the butterflies first flew, or where the coins passed current, 
or who occupied the tombs, or at whom the arrow heads 
were pointed — of these details he is apt to have a very 
mixed and hazy idea. 

But the museum at Bulak is not an ordinary museum by 
any means. The most wearied and travel-hardened tourist 



ANCIENT TREASURES, ANTIQUITIES, AND MUMMIES. 405 

finds here enough treasures to keep his mind alert, and to 
drive the weariness from his brain and his feet. 

We did not linger, however, for many minutes over the 
bronze cats and jackals, the ibises in copper, or the shrine of 
Osiris. We did not take any great joy in the sight of the 
green porcelain deity in the shape of a distorted child stand- 
ing upon two crocodiles and strangling two snakes, neither 
did we go into raptures over the dog-faced ape, the emblem 
of the god Thoth, or even over the golden diadems and 
chains and alabaster vases, and granite hawks with human 
heads, for we were anxious to spend all the time at our dis- 
posal in the apartment of the royal mummies. 

Until within the memory of many of my youngest read- 
ers, the existence of these mummies was not suspected by 
the civilized world. The Arabs, to be sure, knew of them T 
but as the royal tombs furnished them with a perfect mine 
of curios, seals, coins, statuettes, and rolls of papyrus, they 
carefully concealed their knowledge from investigating trav- 
elers. At last the antiquities were found, and treasures 
such as the world had not believed to exist, were unearthed. 
As we enter the museum we see several mummies and coffins 
belonging to priests and kings and princes of the twenty-first 
dynasty. But this was an inglorious dynasty, so history 
tells us. The priest-kings were unable to enforce their 
claims, and they are particularly interesting to us only on 
account of their connection with Solomon ; for it was with 
this dynasty that Solomon made affinity, and took Pha- 
raoh's daughter and brought her into the city of David. 
It was a Pharaoh of this dynasty, too, that took Gezer 
and burned it with fire, and slew the Canaanites that 
dwelt in the envy, and gave it for a present to his daughter, 
Solomon's wife, as we are told in the ninth chapter of 
I Kings. In the time of these Pharaohs, Solomon had 



406 A ROOM FULL OF ROYAL MUMMIES. 

horses and linen yarn brought out of Egypt. We are told 
that an Egyptian chariot in those days cost 650 shekels of 
silver, and a horse 150 shekels. 

As we pass on further into this most interesting funereal 
apartment, we find priests and kings of older dynasties. 
Here is the coffin of Thothmes III. These were more glori- 
ous Pharaohs than their successors. They flourished more 
than 3,500 years ago, extended their conquests as far as the 
Tigris, exacted heavy tributes from the nations whom they 
vanquished, and embellished Thebes, their capital, with mag- 
nificent edifices. 

But most interesting of all in this marvelous room are 
the coffins and the mummies of Sethi I and his son Rameses 
II, for these are the " Pharaohs of the Oppression," whose 
cruel story is told to us so graphically in the Book of Exodus. 

Sethi, it is known, caused his son Rameses to be educated 
with the other young Egyptian nobles, and it is altogether 
probable that one of these Egyptian nobles was Moses, the 
great Lawgiver of Israel. How Pharaoh's daughter found 
him as she went to bathe in the Nile ; how, by the sister's 
gentle ruse, the child's mother was called to be the nurse, 
we all remember. Who has not felt glad when the princess 
said to the anxious mother : " Take this child and nurse it for 
me, and I will give thee thy wages." Never was such a 
congenial task given to a nurse before ! " And the woman 
took the child and nursed it, and the child grew, and she 
brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her 
son, and she called his name Moses, and she said : Because I 
drew him out of the water.'' Now, after reading this brief 
Biblical story, let us turn to our museum again. Look into 
that glass case. There, in that royal gilded coffin, lies a 
shrunken, withered mummy. The lower limbs are yet 
wrapped in the cerements of the grave, but the skull is ex- 



MUMMY OF MOSES S PLAYFELLOW. 



409 



posed and still perfect. The long, hooked, Koman nose, the 
deep-sunken eyeballs, the heavy, square jaw, tell of the war- 
rior and the tyrant. There is Moses's playfellow. 

For more than three thousand years 
he lay silent in the earth, until at last the 
spade of the antiquarian broke into his 
dark resting place, his coffin was opened, 
and he was found to tell us with his firm, 
determined lips, the story of the awful M 
oppression and tyranny which he inaugu- 
rated so many centuries ago. 

1 "Rameses II, the " Pharaoh of the Op- 
pression," died about 3,300 years ago. His 
body was embalmed, placed on board the 
royal barge, and floated up the Nile to 
the Theban City of the Dead, where it 
was laid to rest in the great sarcophagus 
which had been cut from the limestone 
of Biban-el-Mulouk. The location of the 
tomb was well known then, because it had 
been the habit of the monarch to visit 
it frequently during its excavation, but 
for centuries the exact spot remained a 
mighty secret. 

" According to custom, after the burial 
the doorway to the tomb was walled up 
and so disguised by rocks and sand as FITLL LENGTH VIEW 

OF MUMMY OP KING 

to make it impossible for any but the pharaoh.rameses n. 
priests to discover its whereabouts. It (The Pharaoh of the o P - 
was not until 1881 that the real hiding- pw* B ion.) 

place was discovered. For a number of years the officials of 
the Bulak Museum had seen funeral offerings, and other 
antiquities, brought from Thebes by returning tourists, which 

1 Edward L. Wilson in The Century. 



410 FINDING THE MUMMY OF PHARAOH. 

they knew belonged to the dynasty of Rameses II, of his 
father Sethi I, and of his grandfather Rameses I. The 
clear-headed officials argued that the mummies of those 
royal personages must have been discovered by some one. 
The Director-General of the Museum at once organized a 
detective force to help him discover the hiding-place. 

" Arrest after arrest was made among the natives, and 
the bastinado was applied to many a calloused sole which 
had never felt either shoe or sandal. Early in 1881 circum- 
stantial evidence pointed to an Arab named Ahmed Abd-er- 
Rasoul as the one who knew more than he would tell. He 
was arrested and confined in prison for many months, mean- 
time suffering the bastinado repeatedly. Finally his brother 
made a clean breast of the whole affair, and was induced to 
conduct the Curator of the Museum to the hiding-place so 
long looked for. 

" Up the slope of a western mountain a huge isolated 
rock was found. Behind this a spot was reached where the 
stones appeared to have been arranged 'by hand' rather 
than scattered by some upheaval of nature. Arabs were 
employed to remove the loose stones from the well into 
which they had been thrown. "When the bottom of the 
shaft was reached a subterranean passage was found which 
ran westward about twenty-four feet, and then turned 
directly northward, continuing into the heart of the moun- 
tain for about two hundred feet. This passage terminated 
in a mortuary chamber about thirteen by twenty-three feet 
in extent, and six feet in height. 

" There Avas found the mummy of Rameses II, the 
Pharaoh of the Oppression, and his identity was subse- 
quently established beyond question. In the same chamber 
were found nearly forty other mummies of kings, queens, 
princes, and priests. 



HOW PHARAOH LOOKED. 



411 



"The following June the mummy of Rameses II was 
released from its bandages. After the unfolding of the 
mummy the merciless camera was turned upon it, and in 
that sort of picture, which is notorious for never flattering 
nor ever detracting, 
we have a proof of 
the very original 
himself, enabling all 
to 'see how Pha- 
raoh looked.' Eo 
doubt exists about 
the genuineness of 
the mummy, for, in 
black ink, written 
upon the mummy 
case by the high 
priest and King Pin- 
otem, is the record 
testifying to the 
identity of the royal 
contents. The cov- 
erings were all re- 
moved by the care- 
ful hands of one of 
the professors of the 
Bulak Museum, in the presence of the Khedive and other 
distinguished persons." 

The head is long, and small in 'proportion to the body. 
The top of the skull is quite bare. On the temples there are a 
few sparse hairs, but at the poll the hair is quite thick. White 
at the time of death, they have been dyed a light yellow by 
the spices used in embalming. The forehead is low and nar- 
row ; the eyebrows are thick and white ; the eyes are small 

25 




WHERE THE MUMMY OF PHARAOH WAS FOUND. 
ENTRANCE TO THE TOMB. 



412 



DESCRIPTION OF THE MUMMY OF PHARAOH. 



and close together ; the nose is long, arched, and thin, and 
slightly crushed at the tip by the pressure of the bandages. 
The temples are sunken ; the cheek-bones very prominent ; 
the ears round, and pierced like those of a woman for the 




PROFILE OF KING PHARAOH, RAJIESES II. 
(The Pharaoh of the Oppression.) 

wearing of ear-rings. The jaw-bone is massive and strong ; 
the mouth small, and when first exposed was full of some 
kind of black paste. This paste being partly removed dis- 
closed much worn teeth, which, however, are white and 
well preserved. The mustache and beard are white and 
thin. They seem to have been kept shaven during life, but 



LOOKING INTO PHARAOH'S FACE. 



413 



were probably allowed to grow during the king's last illness, 
or they may have grown after death. The skin is of earthy 
brown, spotted with black. Finally, it may be said, the face 
of the mummy gives a fair idea of the face of the living 
king. The expression is unintellectual, perhaps slightly 






FRONT VIEW OF PHARAOH IMMEDIATELY AFTER UNWINDING THE MUMMY. 

(From a special photograph.) 

animal ; but even under the somewhat grotesque disguise of 
mummification, there is plainly to be seen an air of sovereign 
majesty, of resolve, and of pride. The rest of the body is as 
well preserved as the head ; but, in consequence of the reduc- 
tion of the tissues, its external aspect is less lifelike. The 
neck is no thicker than the vertebral column. The chest is 
broad ; the shoulders are square ; the arms are crossed upon 



414 A WICKED RECORD. 

the breast ; the hands are small and dyed with henna, The 
legs and thighs are fleshless ; the feet are long, slender, 
somewhat flat-soled, and dyed, like the hands, with henna. 
The corpse is that of an old man, but of a vigorous and 
robust old man. "We know, indeed, that Rameses II reigned 
for sixty-seven years, and that he must have been nearly one 
hundred years old when he died. 

He had his good points, to be sure, had Rameses the 
Great. He exhibited great zeal as a builder, as a patron of 
art and of sciences, and erected monuments of victory in 
various parts of Egypt. But his monuments have all crum- 
bled, his buildings are leveled with the ground, the arts and 
sciences which he encouraged are outgrown, and have been 
succeeded by nobler arts and sciences. But the one thing 
that he will be known for in all the future history of the 
world, is that which is recorded of him in the first Book of 
Exodus. Surely, it is true, in this case, that " the evil that 
men do lives after them, while the good is oft interred with 
their bones." 

" And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased 
abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty ' y 
and the land was filled with them. 

" Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, which 
knew not Joseph. 

" And he said unto his people, Behold, the people of the 
children of Israel are more and mightier than we ; 

" Come on, let us deal wisely with them, lest they multi- 
ply, and it come to pass, that, when there falleth out any 
war, they join also unto our enemies, and fight against us, 
and so get them up out of the land. 

" Therefore, they did set over them task-masters to afflict 
them with their burdens. And they built for Pharaoh 
treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses. 



HOW ARE THE MIGHTY FALLEN. 415 

" But the more they afflicted them, the more they multi- 
plied and grew. And they grieved because of the children, 
of Israel. 

" And the Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve 
with rigour ; 

" And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in 
mortar, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the 
field ; all their service, wherein they made them serve, was 
with rigour. 

" And Pharaoh charged all his people, saying, Every son 
that is born ye shall cast into the river, and every daughter 
ye shall save alive." 

A sad record, surely, is this for any man to leave after 
him, and yet we can believe it of this old Pharaoh, as we 
see him grim and determined even in death, lying in his 
coffin, which is exposed to the curious gaze of every sight- 
seer. None so poor now as to do reverence to this ancient 
ruler of the world. He, at whose beck kings rallied to his 
standards, or concluded peace at his command, lies there, a 
mere spectacle for every curiosity monger. The poorest 
vagabond of the realm can now criticise his hooked nose and 
his retreating forehead, and his long and scrawny neck with 
impunity. The one on whom kings dared not look without 
trembling, is now known only as a persecutor and oppressor, 
who is hated and despised by Jews and Christians alike, 
though he has lain in his coffin for more than three thou- 
sand years. The old rule is forgotten, and no good and 
only evil is spoken of this man who has been so long dead. 

Near by is the coffin and the mummy of his father, Sethi 
I, who also shows in the very contour of his head that he 
was a Pharaoh born to rule. And here is the scriptural 
account of the end of this man whose mummy we see before 



41G 



WHERE IS THE PHARAOH OF THE EXODUS ? 



us. " And it came to pass in the process of time, that the 
king of Egypt died, and the children of Israel sighed by rea- 
son of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up 
unto God, and God heard their groaning, and God remem- 
bered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with 
Jacob, and God looked upon the children of Israel, and God 
had respect unto them." 

We know the tragic history that followed, the groanings, 
the oppression, the plague, the deliverance, the passage of 
the Red Sea, the overwhelming of Pharaoh and his chariots 
in the waves. The Pharaoh of the oppression lies before us 
in the museum of Bulak ; but the Pharaoh of the Exodus* 
whom the Bible declares found a watery grave under the 
Red Sea's waves, has never been found among the royal 
mummies of Egypt. 




CHAPTER XXII. 

ON THE BANKS OF THE NILE — OUR CLIMB TO THE TOP 
OF THE GREAT PYRAMIDS — BESET BY ARABS — AMUS- 
ING ADVENTURES AND EXPERIENCES. 

An Ancient Proverb — Our First View of the Pyramids — Man-made 
Mountains — Monuments Which Never Disappoint the Traveler — 
Could They be Built To-day ? — A Blow at the Conceit of the Nine- 
teenth Century — Comfort for the Optimist — Why the Pyramids were 
Built and How — The Tombs of the Pharaohs — A Small Pyramid for a 
Short Reign — A More Intimate Acquaintance — The Road to Cheops 
— " Mafish Backsheesh " — Unnecessary Attention — The Comanches of 
the Desert — An Appeal to the Sheik — Getting Up-stairs — How the 
Stout Lady Reached the Top — Desolation, Dearth, and Death — Life- 
giving Father Nile — Beautiful Cairo — An Ancient Story of the Pyra- 
mids — Avaricious Arabs — Destroying the Pyramids — Looking Down 
on Forty Centuries — A Ride on a Camel to the Sphinx. 



I VERYTHIXG fears time, but time 
fears the pyramids," is an old 
Arabian proverb that has been 
current in the Land of the Pyra- 
mids for more than seven hundred 
years. Our first glimpse of these 
time-feared monuments was from 
the railway train as we ap- 
proached Cairo. We knew that 
somewhere off in the distance, 
out of the sandy desert, arose 
these marvelous monuments of a 
past age, and for some time before the domes and minarets 
of Cairo appeared in sight, we strained our eyes to get the 
first glimpse of them. 

At length a bend in the road brought them into view, 

(417) 




418 ONE OF THE WONDERS OF THE WORLD. 

somewhat dwarfed by distance, to be sure, but unmistakably 
the pyramids of picture-book and fancy, of boyhood's 
dream and manhood's anticipation. They are so unique and 
unapproached by any other species of architecture, so easily 
represented, and so readily compassed by the imagination 
that one thinks he is seeing old, familiar friends, as they first 
loom up on the horizon. The pyramids of the old geogra- 
phies and of more modern photographs are here before us, 
in solid, substantial stone. They look as we thought they 
looked. They do not surprise us by their vastness on the 
one hand, nor disappoint us by their insignificance as com- 
pared with previous anticipations, on the other. 

For almost every other famous sight one is somewhat 
unprepared, however familiar he may be with pictures and 
descriptions and measurements. The Taj Mahal of India, 
for instance, goes beyond the greatest expectations. No 
photograph can tell the traveler of its graceful lines, its 
aspiring minarets, its dazzling white marble, or its incrusta- 
tions of precious stones. The temples of Southern India are 
only feebly portrayed by photographs. Of the Colosseum, 
one can get but a sectional and partial view, and one has to 
stand within its vast sweep of stones to appreciate its magni- 
tude. Saint Peter's disappoints most travelers by its seem- 
ing want of size, as compared with his great expectations. 
But for the pyramids one is well prepared. Not that they 
do not grow on the imagination. Almost every stupendous 
work of architecture does thus improve upon acquaintance. 
The mind must have some time to adjust itself to its propor- 
tions, and the longer one gazes upon the pyramids, and the 
nearer he approaches their towering bulk, the more im- 
pressed is he with these wonders of the ancient and modern 
world, the more he marvels how they could possibly be 
built in rude ages when labor-saving machinery was com par- 



TIME-DEFYING MONUMENTS. 



419 



atively unknown, the more he begins to suspect that, after 
all, these ages which could have built the pyramids were not 
so rude as his modern conceit is prone to suppose. 

It is doubtful if they could be built to-day with all the 
appliances that modern invention has rendered familiar, 
with the aid of steam and electricity, and every contrivance 
which the ingenuity of four thousand years has been able to 
supply. It is doubtful if those vast blocks of stone could be 




THE GREAT PYRAMIDS. 



quarried or transported, or raised to their present position, 
or laid so accurately, by any master mason of to-day. 

When we think that the building of the pyramids was 
only an index to the civilization of the centuries that saw 
them erected, our inflated notions concerning the importance 
of the nineteenth century in the roll of the ages grows 
somewhat smaller. The pyramids are like isolated peaks in 
some vast sea, which still remain above the surface to tell of 
the mighty continents which have been submerged. Every- 
thing perishable has been swept away, cities and farms, 
canals and roadways, the accumulations of centuries of 



420 WHY WERE THE PYRAMIDS BUILT ? 

wealth, the arts and sciences of the ages long gone by, are 
all buried under the sand of the desert. The pyramids 
alone remain to tell us what the world then was, and to 
dwarf the pigmy products and enterprises of the present 
day. Surely there is a law of degeneration, as well as a law 
of evolution at work in the world. In some respects the 
world is going backward instead of forward. 

In some particulars, we cannot equal our great-great- 
great ancestors who flourished in Moses' time, but the op- 
timist may well believe, — and there is nothing to dispel the 
pleasant thought, — that if in material grandeur we cannot 
compete with the ages of the past, in moral and spiritual 
matters this old world never attained such an eminence as 
since the time when the light from the face of Christ shone 
upon her. If we build no pyramids in these days, we do 
build hospitals and colleges and orphan asylums on a vast 
scale. If there are no magnificent palaces of the Pharaohs, 
there are innumerable temples consecrated to the relief of 
suffering and the uplifting of humanity. If we can erect no 
Cheops in these days, it is at least true that we do not sacri- 
fice the lives of a hundred thousand peasants every year in 
the erection of a senseless funereal monument, built to 
gratify individual vanity ; for it is very certain that the pyr- 
amids of Gizeh, and all the other pyramids that have made 
the land of Egypt famous, are simply funereal monuments, 
huge tombs for the kings ; and, though some fanciful writers 
have professed to find in them the embodiment of all the 
sciences, the standards of weights and measures, and even a 
prophecy of the birth of Christ, these theories have very 
little weight among scholars of the present day, and it is 
generally believed that these huge monuments were simply 
receptacles for the mummies of the Pharaohs who built 
them. 



MISERY VENDERS AND VILE IMPOSTORS. 421 

Each succeeding Pharaoh began work on his own tomb 
as soon as he ascended the throne. At first the monument 
which he built over his sarcophagus was comparatively 
small, and if he died after a short reign, it remained a small 
and insignificant pyramid. This accounts for the smaller 
pyramids which dot the desert. If, however, his reign was 
longer, he added one course of stone to another, building 
always from the outside, and in such a way that the pyr- 
amid would be complete in itself whenever he might die, 
after the course of stone which had been begun was finished. 
Every succeeding incrustation of stones was, of course, a 
larger and more stupendous undertaking than the last, and 
it was only the Pharaohs who lived to the greatest age who 
could construct such monuments as Cheops and Cephron. 

But we have lingered quite too long already in the dis- 
tance. It can be imagined that an excursion to the pyra- 
mids was one of the very first pleasures that we enjoyed in 
Cairo. We could not see those giants looming up in the 
distance without desiring more intimate acquaintance, and 
so, taking a carriage at our hotel, a drive of an hour and 
a half brought us to their very base. We had heard har- 
rowing tales of the importunate beggar, and so we had 
practiced, before leaving the hotel, and on the route, the im- 
portant phrase, "Mafish backsheesh," which was all we knew 
and all we needed to know of Arabic. At the same time we 
steeled our hearts against all kinds of miseries and persistent 
pleadings, comforting ourselves in our hardheartedness with 
the fact that all our friends and all our guide books told us 
that these misery-venders were mostly imposters, and that it 
was the most mistaken kind of charity to heed their im- 
portunate cries ; that some of them were very well-to-do in 
the world, and were better able to give backsheesh to their 
victims than was the average traveler to give it to them. 



422 



NEARING THE PYRAMIDS. 



The road from Cairo to Cheops is, for this desert land, a 
very pleasant road, being broad and well made, and lined 
with trees on either side. The pyramids occupy a low 
plateau about fifteen hundred yards square ; and a con- 
siderable ascent leads from the level road to the foot of the 
great pyramid. 













BY THE ROADSIDE IN EGYPT. 

Long before we reach this spot, however, our troubles 
with the Bedouins begin. For rods they run along beside 
the carriage, some on two legs, some on one, and some on 
three or four ; for crutches and canes are part of the stock in 
trade of these beggars, with all kinds of deformities and 
diseases — the more disgusting and loathsome, the larger is 



BESET BY BEGGARS. 423 

their capital. In some places they even strew unnecessary- 
sand and gravel before the horses for the alleged purpose of 
making it more easy for them to ascend the hill, but for the 
real purpose of having a pretext for making some exorbitant 
demand on the traveler. However, we are able to resist 
these importunities, and it is only when the carriage actually 
stops, and we are obliged to dismount, that matters become 
serious. Here we are surrounded apparently by all the 
Bedouins of the desert, congregated together for the purpose 
of boosting our precious selves up the pyramid. They sur- 
round us like a tribe of hostile Comanches on the war-path. 
They gesticulate and scream, seize us by the arm, and 
apparently intend to capture us by main force, while they 
try to frighten off all other claimants for the booty. 

At length, however, our manhood asserts itself, and our 
womanhood too, for that matter — for it must be remem- 
bered that there is a feminine pilgrim in this party — and 
summoning all our Arabic, in the most impressive tones we 
can summon, and with gestures that are meant to be as 
emphatic as their own, we cry out, "Iscut walla mafish 
backsheesh ! " (Be quiet or you shall have no fee.) What we 
lack in accuracy of pronunciation, we make up in vigor of 
expression. At any rate the Arabs seem to understand us, 
and, falling back a step or two, there is a temporary lull in 
the babel. We then appeal to the old Sheik, who stands in 
the thick of the crowd, a venerable, white-bearded old man, 
trying to bring some little order out of the chaos, and he 
assigns to each of us two swarthy, half-naked Bedouins, to 
take us by either arm, while he tells us that we can have 
another, without extra charge, to push behind if we desire. 

The huge blocks of stone which form the outer coating 
of Cheops are usually more than three feet in height, while 
some of them reach nearly to the chin of a full grown man. 



424 A HARD EARNED VICTORY. 

It will be seen that it is with no mincing step that one can 
mount these enormous stones. But somehow or other one 
course after another is surmounted, a little hollow will afford 
a place for the toe, the muscular Bedouin will climb like a 
cat, and, reaching down, will lift one to his height, while his 
companion below pushes one upward. Then, folloAving 
along this course for a few yards, we find a place where it is 
possible to mount to the next course of stones, and then to 
the next, and so on until we stand on the very summit. 

The day that we ascended was honored by the ascent of 
an enormously stout lady, who, though she started some 
time before we did, was soon overtaken. In spite of her 
" too, too solid flesh," her spirit was brave and resolute, and 
she had determined to conquer the pyramid and stand on its 
apex. Most tourists would have been discouraged from the 
attempt by so much superfluous avoirdupois, but not so with 
our fair and fat excursionist. Her courage was evidently 
quite as large as her body, and though she puffed and 
panted, and caused all her numerous retainers to puff and 
pant in sympathy, yet she persevered. Lighter and more 
agile tourists started long after she began the ascent, caught 
up with her and passed her almost at a gallop, but she still 
puffed and panted on. As many Bedouins pulled in front as 
could get hold of a finger or an arm — as many more pushed 
behind, and at last mind triumphed over matter, and our 
Amazon stood upon the peak, and was able to wave her 
handkerchief in triumph to her timid friends below who had 
not dared to make the ascent. 

It must not be thought, however, that even the most 
agile tourist bounds like a young gazelle from one course of 
stones to another, without stopping until he stands upon the 
top. Though our guides are in a hurry to get up and get 
down again, we are in no haste, and we insist upon sitting 



VIEW FROM THE TOP OF THE PYRAMIDS. 425 

down to rest wherever we choose, for the view is growing 
more and more superb the higher we ascend. 

The yellow sand of the desert lies beneath us like a vast, 
silent, petrified sea, lapping the very feet of the pyramids. 
On the plateau near by are two other huge pyramids, while 
one or two little ones — the children of the family — lie at 
our feet. Near by, too, is the incomprehensible Sphinx, the 
wonder and mystery of the ages, calm and resolute and 
silent, yet smiling still, though sadly battered and mutilated 
by the vandal hands of iconoclasts. 

In every direction except one, as far as the eye can reach, 
is a scene of absolute desolation and death. Interminable 
reaches of yellow sand, no oasis, no green ribbon of a grass- 
like stream, no solitary palm tree waving its fronds in the 
air — the most mournful country upon which the sun of 
heaven shines. In the far distance, to the south, rise the 
pyramids of Abusir and Saccara, where were made some 
wonderful "finds" of hidden treasures. But these monu- 
ments of dead kings only seem to emphasize the desolation 
of the landscape. The only object which breaks its mo- 
notony are these majestic tombs — the monuments of a 
civilization which has been dead for three thousand years. 

But in another direction the scene changes. Beautiful 
Cairo, mellowed and glorified by the haze of distance, rises 
in the east with its countless minarets and beautifully 
rounded domes, and all about the city, which is laved by the 
life-giving Mle, is the deep-hued vegetation which makes a 
city possible here in the midst of the desert. Wherever the 
river goes, or a branch of the river, or a canal from that 
branch, or an irrigating ditch from the canal, thither is 
spread in fan-like lines the refreshing green that forms such 
a blessed picture of life and health as contrasted with the 
deadly sands upon which this little fan of green is laid. 



42G 



A STRANGE AND CURIOUS SIGHT. 



When we draw nearer to Father Kile we shall see many 
strange and curious sights. Possibly we shall get a glimpse 
of a crocodile, and we may be so fortunate as to come upon 
one of these ugly saurians who has devoured his last infant 
Egyptian, and who, bound, stunned, and helpless, is at the 
mercy of his captors. His hide will serve a more useful 
purpose than ever before when it is turned into a scaly grip- 
sack for the use and behoof of some American drummer. 



ip:|M'!|ii|',H»»«K"i;!i: ti'iAli"''*.;!:'"'",*!!!;,'^};,;, 




A SCENE ON THE NILE. 



Of course such scenes are more common on the upper Kile 
than they are near Cairo. 

While we are sitting here on the pyramid-top, looking at 
the view from one of the upper courses of stone, it will be a 
good time for us to learn something of the construction of 
the great monument we are ascending, and something of 
its ancient history. 

I was much interested in the account that Herodotus 
gives of the building of Cheops, for no one can be more 
accurate or reliable than the great historian in regard to 
objects which he himself saw. Here is his account of it : 
" This pyramid was first built in the form of a flight of steps. 



HOW THE PYRAMIDS WERE BUILT. 427 

After the workmen had completed the pyramid in this form, 
they raised the other stones used for the incrustation by 
means of machines made of short beams, from the ground to 
the first tier of steps, and, after the stone was placed there, 
it was raised to the second tier by another machine, for there 
were as many machines as there were tiers of steps, or per- 
haps the same machine, if it were easily moved, was raised 
from one tier to the other, as it was required for lifting the 
stones. The highest part of the pyramid was thus finished 
first, the parts adjoining it were taken next, and the lowest 
part, next to the earth, was completed last. 

"It was recorded on the pyramid in Egyptian writing 
[the stones which recorded these facts, I may say, have long 
been removed, and there is now no writing visible] how 
man}^ radishes, onions, and roots of garlic had been dis- 
tributed among the workmen, and if I rightly remember 
what the interpreter who read the writing told me," says 
Herodotus, "the money they cost amounted to sixteen hun- 
dred talents of silver [more than $170,000]. If this was 
really the case, how much more must have been spent on the 
iron with which they worked than the food and clothing of 
the workmen." 

This account of the ancient historian of the manner in 
which the pyramid was constructed has been entirely con- 
firmed by modern researches. 

It can very easily be believed that these vast structures, 
with their hidden recesses, early excited the cupidity of the 
successors of the Pharaohs. It is said that the pyramids 
were first opened and examined by the Persians about five 
hundred years before Christ, and it is very certain that 
Arabs made many attempts to get within the treasure 
chamber. These vast receptacles of the bodies of the 
kings of ancient Egvpt were like the forbidden room in 

26 



428 WHAT WAS DISCOVERED IN THE PYRAMIDS. 

Bluebeard's palace, or the box or closet which the anxious 
mother tells the curious child must not be investigated. 
The very fact that it was sealed excited the cupidity and 
curiosity of these children of the desert, and they were for- 
ever trying to pry open the doors, and get at the fabulous 
treasures which they believed were concealed within. The 
vastness and the strength of the pyramids is in no way 
better indicated than by the fact that for so long they 
resisted the prying curiosity of these Khalifs, who had noth- 
ing better to do than to pull down what the Pharaohs had 
built up. 

But it is very certain that they discovered within the re- 
cesses of the pyramids, when, after hundreds of years, they 
were able to force an entrance, very little to pay them for 
their time and trouble. It was not until the year 1820, 
fully twelve hundred years after the first attempt was made 
that Khalif Mamun got within the great pyramid, and it is 
said that the gold found within was exactly enough to pay 
for the cost of breaking and entering. Along with the 
treasure, so runs the Arabian tradition, was found a marble 
slab bearing an inscription which said that the money beside 
it sufficed to pay for the work of the inquisitive king, but 
that if he attempted to go further, he would have his labor 
for his pains, for he would find nothing worth taking. 

It is altogether probable, as historians have suggested, 
that if this gold were found, it had been previously placed 
there by the calif who made the investigation, in order that 
his people might not be able to chide him with having 
expended so much money for nothing. 

Some of the vandals who succeeded Khalif Mamun were 
not content to search the supposed treasure chamber further, 
but set out deliberately to destroy with malice aforethought 
the gigantic mementoes of the past. Sultan Othman, who 



SEEKING TO DESTROY THE PYRAMIDS. 429 

lived at the close of the twelfth century, and whose name 
ought to be forever execrated by all lovers of the magnifi- 
cent, set to work with the fell purpose of destroying the 
third pyramid, which we can see from the top of Gizeh a 
little to the west of us. He actually organized a party of 
workmen to undertake this destruction, pitched a camp at 
the base of the pyramid, and labored incessantly for eight 
months; but the pyramid was stronger than the puny 
Othman. His eight months of labor, and the enormous 
sums which he spent in the work of destruction practically 
effected nothing, except as one historian says, "the shameful 
mutilation of the pyramid and the demonstration of the 
weakness and incapacity of the explorers* When the stones 
that were removed are regarded at the present day, one 
would think that the structure had been entirely destroyed ; 
but when one then looks at the pyramid itself, one sees that 
it has suffered no material damage, and that a part of its 
incrustation has been stripped off on one side only." This 
fact, concerning the impotence of this iconoclast, tells vol- 
umes of the strength and solidity and might of the pyra- 
mids. A great force of men, working incessantly for eight 
months, could only scar and mutilate its face on one side. 
The Pharaohs could build what their successors could not 
overthrow. 

Now we are sufficiently rested to pursue our journey to 
the top ; following the zigzag line, planting our toes in the 
convenient crevices, jumping and springing as best we can, 
allowing our guides to pull and push us wherever it may be 
necessary, we at last reach the summit, and the view which 
was before partial and incomplete is now full-orbed and 
most magnificent. Nowhere is there such a contrast of life 
and death; nowhere else can we look down upon such 
mighty hieroglyphics of the ages. 



430 VENDERS OF SPURIOUS CURIOSITIES. 

As we stand below, "forty centuries look down upon us," 
as Napoleon reminded his troops, when they stood under the 
shadow of the pyramids. As we gaze from the top, we look 
down upon forty centuries. Every mighty pyramid is 
eloquent with the tale of a past civilization, forever forgot- 
ten and blotted out. Even the silent Sphinx seems to have 
a tongue to tell us of the glories of the past, over which she 
looks with her solemn, unblinking eyes. Every grain of 
sand, if it could tell its tale, Avould have a stoiy more 
marvelous than the fictions of Scheherezade. 

We are aroused from these reveries concerning the great- 
ness of the past and the desolation of the present, by the in- 
evitable Bedouins and their exasperating cry for baksheesh. 
We arise in our wrath, and tell the miserable horde that if 
they say another word about backsheesh before we reach 
the bottom of the pyramid, they will not get a single piaster 
beyond the strictly legal limits of their pay. Though this 
speech is delivered in queen's English, unadorned with a 
single word of Arabic, they seem to understand its purport, 
and subside to some extent. 

But we are not relieved from the pestiferous attention of 
the curiosity vender or the dealer in spurious -coins, who 
haunts the pyramid. He claims, of course, that his coins 
were found in the vaults of this very pyramid, though Ave 
know very well that they were undoubtedly made in Bir- 
mingham or Sheffield. But what cares he for truth or 
poetry ! What cares he for the story of the pyramid, or the 
tale of the Sphinx ! All these things are old fables to him, 
and he is only concerned to work off upon us his spurious 
relics, his " antikkers " • as he calls them, in his Arabian 
English. 

One of our guides insists that his name is Mark Twain, 
"Abdul Mark Twain," he solemnly informs us, and when 



A WONDERFUL FEAT. 



431 



we accuse him of prevarication, and tell him that we left 
Mark Twain at the foot of the pyramid, and did not engage 
him for the ascent, he unblushingly informs us that there are 
three Mark Twains among the guides, but that he is Abdul 
Mark Twain. We cannot shake his faith in his own iden- 
tity, and then he solemnly informs us that he is the Mark 
Twain, who, when the humorist visited the pyramid, ran 
down Cheops and up 
the side of Cephron 
and back again, all 
within ten minutes. 
He offers to do the 
same feat for us for 
the sum of four 
francs, but we refuse 
his blandishments. 

When we reached 
the bottom, we set- 
tled the bill for the 
ascent, not with our 
importunate guide, 
but with the grey- 
bearded Sheik who 
awaited us, paying 
the regular fee and a 
reasonable baksheesh to each of our guides. Of course this is 
not dqne without protestations and the howlings of impotent 
wrath that they cannot extract from us ten times what is 
their due. But we are oblivious to their threats, as- 
sume utter ignorance of their language, which is not difficult 
to do, escape from their clutches, and make our way to the 
Sphmx. 

Of course we must go thither in as romantic a way as 




THE FLIGHT DOWN THE PYRAMID. 



432 RIDING A CAMEL. 

possible, and so we mount one of the ragged camels which 
are waiting to convey travelers to the silent stone woman, 
and in this manner make 'the short journey. 

In order to allow tourists to mount, the camel unlimbers 
himself, doubles in his fore legs and shuts them up like a 
jackknife, does the same thing with his hind legs, and is 
then sufficiently low, so that with some difficulty we can 
reach the saddle. When we are safely seated astride his 
hump, he begins to undouble himself, first unjointing his 
hind legs, then getting upon his knees, and finally upon his 
great, splay-footed, spongy feet. Preserving our equilibrium 
as well as possible, and holding on with both hands, so as not 
to be thrown over his head, we await his next movement. 
This is even more trying than the first, for as he stretches 
his front legs, we rock back and forth, as though we were 
astride a miniature earthquake, but at last he is on his feet 
again, and plods off solemnly with his nose high in the air, 
towards the Sphinx of which he seems a fitting counterpart. 

It is only a short journey, and is accomplished in a few 
minutes, and we find ourselves face to face with this silent 
wonder of the ages. The Sphinx was doubtless far more 
impressive before she had her nose battered off, her ear 
amputated, and her eyes blackened, by the combined spite of 
iconoclasts and relic hunters. 

An old Mohammedan Sheik, who took the second com- 
mandment too literally, and vowed that the world should 
not have any graven images if he could help it, is responsible 
for much of this mutilation. The Mamelukes accomplished 
much more in this direction, having used the Sphinx as a 
target for their cannon-balls, and relic hunters have added 
their puny might by chipping away here and there bits of 
stone to adorn their Avretched little museums. "We can 
scarcely get an adequate idea of this magnificent monument 



THE INCOMPREHENSIBLE SPHINX. 



433 



of the ages when in its pristine glory, but we can easily be- 
lieve what an old writer tells us who saw the statue when in 
perfect preservation ; that its face was very pleasing, and 
was of a graceful and beautiful type. " One might almost. 
say,' 1 he adds, "that it smiles winningly." The Arabs have 
a very significant name for the Sphinx, which may be trans- 
lated "The Watchful." This is the impression that she 
still gives to every beholder. There is still a wakeful intel- 
ligence in the mutilated face ; there is still a calm suggestion 




THE SPHINX. 



of limitless vision in the eyes. There is still a calm poise in 
the outstretched lions' feet and in the whole attitude of the 
unfinished body, which leads one to say, "This is the 
watcher of the desert." From her fathomless eyes she has 
looked out upon everything that has happened for four 
thousand years, and she will still watch over the sands of 
the desert, in spite of iconoclast and relic hunters, down to 
"the last syllable of recorded time." 

A few feet from the Sphinx is a great temple composed 
of granite and alabaster, and in the vicinity are other 



434 



ADIEU TO THE EGYPTIAN DESERT. 



wonders as well. But we are satisfied with our day's work. 
This stupendous pyramid and the magnificent Sphinx satisfy 
all our aspirations for sightseeing. We can absorb, to-day, 
no more of the marvels and glories of the ancient world, and 
we will return to our hotel in Cairo, and later to our home 
in America, to think over and to dream of the wonders of 
the Egyptian desert. 




CHAPTER XXIII. 

ALL ABOARD FOR JERUSALEM. 

A Stormy Day in March — A Test for Brave Hearts and Strong Stom- 
achs — Throwing Up Jonah — Going Ashore at Jaffa — How We Got 
Down the Ship's Side — Dumping Passengers in the Small Boat — Up 
to the Ridge Pole and Down the Side of the Great Tent — A Terrible 
Accident — A Highwayman's Demand — " Your Money or Your Life " 
— A Near Approach — Unspeakable Filth — The House of Simon the 
Tanner — Simon's Vat — View from the Housetop — Our Rural Friend 
from New York State — "Them Jimkirridges " — Through the Holy 
Land Behind a Steam Engine — The Sentimental Man — The Reward of 
Indulging a Sentiment — Our Dragoman — How Abdallah Caught the 
Doctors Napping — When the Sun and the Moon Stood Still — The 
Dapper Conductor in His Red Fez — The Rose of Sharon. 




E sailed from Alexandria one 
stormy day in March, and, after 
a journey of some four and 
twenty hours, reached ancient 
Jaffa, the chief seaport of Jeru- 
salem. 

Joppa, or Jaffa as it is now 
called, deserves its bad reputa- 
tion as the worst port in all the 
world. Brave travelers who 
will not blanch at any other ter- 
rors which a journey around the 
world has in store for them, confess to an unworthy fear of 
this landing place, and strong stomachs which never rebel 
under ordinary circumstances, however boisterous the seas, 
turn themselves inside out when they go ashore at this port. 

(435) 



436 OX SHIPBOARD WITH JONAH. 

"Throwing up Jonah" becomes more than a figurative 
phrase in the roadstead of Jaffa, for it will be remembered 
that it was from this very town that the famous navigator of 
old set sail, when, attempting to run away from God's com- 
mand, he took ship for Tarshish. 

Modern navigators on the Syrian coast have not forgotten 
the Bible story, for, whenever the sea is unusually rough, 
they say to this day, that Jonah has taken ship and the 
waves will not subside until he is landed. 

Evidently, Jonah was on board when we sailed up to 
Jaffa's gates, for the waves danced and leaped about our 
steamer and grew every moment more boisterous, though 
the rain had ceased and the sun was shining brightly over- 
head. 

When the good steamer of the Egyptian or Khedival 
line on which we were embarked came to anchor, the health 
officer, after some delay, declared that we might land. Then 
we could see half a score of stout boats, each armed by half 
a dozen rowers, start out from behind the line of rocks which 
flank the coast and form a poor apology for a breakwater. 

There is great rivalry between the boats, for all the pas- 
sengers are regarded as legitimate prey by the representa- 
tives of tourist companies, and the boat that first comes to 
the steamer is first served with its quota of passengers. 

As they near the steamer, the boatmen pull with re- 
doubled energy, and then ensues such a tumbling and scramb- 
ling and rushing and snatching of baggage as defies de- 
scription. 

Most of us, however, have purchased our landing tickets 
in advance, from one of the aforesaid tourists' companies, at 
an absurdly high price, it must be confessed. The boatmen 
of one of these rival companies wear red shirts, the other 
blue, and we have little difficulty in picking out our blue-coat 



A PERILOUS DESCENT. . 437 

or our red-coat, as the case may be. We have to use vio- 
lence, however, to get our small packages out of the hands 
of the wrong man and into the hands of the right man, who 
finally dumps them into one of his own boats, and then pro- 
ceeds to dump us in after the baggage. It is an exciting 
operation, especially for women and fat people. 

The little boats are dancing about the big steamer like 
pith balls on an electric plate. Now they mount on the 
crest of a wave almost to the bulwarks, and then they sink 
down, down, down, far below the usual water line. 

It requires no little dexterity and agility to get over the 
steamer's side and into the little boat under these circum- 
stances. One must watch his chance, and when the landing 
boat rises on the wave to its highest point, he must rush 
down the gangway and throw himself into the arms of the 
boatman who is waiting to receive him below. 

All this is done amid shouts of sailors and shrieks of 
frightened tourists and dashing of waves and creaking of 
windlasses and whistling of wind in the rigging until it 
seems that Pandemonium itself is let loose. 

At length, however, the last passenger has been swung 
over the ship's side, and the last trunk has been dropped into 
the capacious boats, which, with the greatest difficulty, are 
kept from grinding themselves into kindling wood on the 
iron hull of the steamer. Our boatmen shove off, and then 
begins a royal struggle with the waves. 

Up, up, up, we go, to the very ridgepole of a great billow 
which slopes away on either side like a vast tent. Then we 
slide down, down, down the billowy side of our watery tent, 
until we reach the trough of the wave, only to mount the 
side of the next wave that is rushing our way, as though it 
would collapse and overwhelm us in its capacious folds. 

Thus we mount one billow after another, our sturdy boat- 



438 A DISTRESSING ACCIDENT. 

man always putting the prow of the boat into the wave, and 
never allowing it to strike us broadside, until at last we 
round the edge of the protecting rocks and hear that 
" blessedest of sounds," the keel of our boat grating on the 
pebbles of Jaffa's shore. 

With all its seeming frightfulness, there is probably little 
real danger in this landing, and comparatively few accidents 
occur except by reason of gross carelessness. 

A few weeks before we reached Jaffa, however, a very 
distressing accident of this sort had occurred. A large party 
of travelers, mostly Russian pilgrims, had embarked on one 
of these boats for the shore. The day was stormy and the 
sea tempestuous ; very much such a day, we imagine, as that 
on which we landed. The passengers had all agreed with 
the boatmen to be taken to the shore for half a napoleon 
(nearly two dollars), a sum which, for the distance carried, is 
exorbitant. But no sooner was the boat in the middle of the 
boiling, seething waters, half way between the ship and the 
shore, Avhen the avaricious boatmen demanded double fares 
and threw up their oars, declaring that they Avould go no 
farther until their demands were met. 

This was no better than highway robbery, and naturally 
the passengers refused to accede to it. In the dispute that 
ensued, a tremendous wave struck the boat, and, in the 
twinkling of an eye, overturned it, and after a few vain 
struggles with the engulfing waves, it sank to the bottom. 
Not one of the pilgrims was saved, though all the greedy, 
rascally boatmen, being strong swimmers, succeeded in reach, 
ing the rocks. 

It is a satisfaction to know that all these murderers were 
apprehended and lodged in jail, where we hope they will 
remain for many a year before they are released to risk the 
lives of other tourists by their grasping cupidity. 



JAFFA AS IT IS. 439 

Jaffa is an imposing looking city from the sea. Its white- 
washed stone houses swarm up the side of a steep hill, and 
spread themselves out over its crest until one fondly believes 
that he is gazing upon a city of palaces. 

But in this case, as in so many others, distance lends en- 
chantment to the view, and when we actually land and thread 
the narrow, tortuous streets, we find that it is about the filthi- 
est and most unkempt city on which the sun shines. 

The streets are full of swaying camels and pushing little 
donkeys and unwashed ragged Syrians of every degree of 
poverty and wretchedness. 

It is almost inconceivable how some of the narrow streets 
can remain as filthy as they are. One would think that even 
an occasional shower would wash some of the accumulated 
dirt of the ages off them, and that a rainy season would sen- 
sibly sweeten these filthy thoroughfares. 

Apparently, however, nature has given up in despair. 
The dirt of the days of Jonah still clings to one's feet in 
greasy clods. The mud and filth of the time of Dorcas is 
comparatively modern. We have always supposed that Dor- 
cas was a model housekeeper as well as a good lady of 
most charitable purposes, and we have no doubt that she 
kept the street in front of her own house clean and sweet. 
But what is one woman against a whole city full of dirty 
Arabs ? Yery likely Dorcas and all the good women who 
have lived there before and since her day have become dis- 
couraged, and have allowed Jaffa to go on at the slovenly, 
down-at-the-heel gait, which is now so characteristic of it. 

Though we cannot find any very authentic memorials of 
Dorcas, the traditional house of Simon the Tanner is pointed 
out to us, and a pretty well authenticated tradition it is as 
traditions go in this land. 

In the first-place, we are conducted into a dark, thick- 



440 THE HOUSE OF SIMON THE TANNER. 

walled apartment, where we need a candle even to see the 
outlines of the room, and are told that this was the very spot 
where the ancient house existed, and that the stones we see 
constituted its walls eighteen hundred years ago. 

Just outside this room is a courtyard, in one corner of 
which is a well and a stone trough, which tradition says is 
the vat in which St. Peter's friend of old soaked his leather. 

In the well hangs an old oaken bucket from which we 
drank a full draught of the sparkling water, as perhaps 
Simon and Peter had done many a time in the past. 

Prom one corner of this courtyard a flight of stairs leads 
to the housetop, the most famous part of this establishment, 
for here it is said St. Peter slept when he had the wondrous 
vision which was fraught with such momentous meaning to 
all the world. 

Here he saw the sheet let down from heaven which con- 
tained all manner of four-footed beasts while at the same 
time came the command, " Pise, Peter, kill and eat." 

But Peter demurred, saying, " Not so, Lord, for I have 
never eaten anything common or unclean." 

Then came the significant command which wrought such 
a wondrous change in the heart of the narrow, conventional 
Jew, and which made him the broad-minded, generous apos- 
tle whom all ages delight to honor. 

" What God hath cleansed that call not thou common." 

Was ever a vision accompanied by greater results ? 

Is any place fraught with deeper significance than that 
humble housetop from which was proclaimed to Peter and 
through Peter to the world the momentous lesson that the 
Fatherhood of God involves the Brotherhood of Man ? 

The view from this housetop makes it well worthy of a 
visit apart from its historic significance. 

Here one looks out upon the waves of the same port that 



"starving all around the world." 441 

lias been historic since Hiram, King of Tyre, by this route 
sent cedar wood and all manner of precious gifts to Solomon. 

Between these same encircling rocks the little vessel on 
which Jonah had embarked must have steered her course ; 
over these waves half the famous men of old made their way, 
as they came and went through this ocean gate of Syria. 

After viewing this really fine view from Simon's house- 
top, after visiting the site of Napoleons hospital prison, 
where, if historians are to believed, at his orders a horrible 
butchery of sick French soldiers occurred ; after spending 
a few sentimental moments in the vicinity of Dorcas's 
reputed abode, we did not care to stay in this squalid city. 

We did stay long enough, however, to meet a typical 
character from New York state, a good old man, who, 
though he had been around the world, and tasted the food 
of every clime, had not shaken the hayseed out of his hair or 
got used to his best "store clothes," which sat upon him 
awkwardly and loosely. 

As we looked across the table, at Jaffa's very indifferent 
hotel, where a bovd of thin onion soup had been succeeded 
by a dish of garlic-scented meat, our rural friend looked 
across at us and said, with a pathetic wail in his voice, " I 
have been starving all around the world ; in Japan, China, 
and India we have been half starved to death, for we are 
Americans, you see, and ain't used to this sort of thing." 
"We sympathized with him with all our hearts, for, although 
it had been our happy lot to spend most of our time among 
friends where we felt almost as much at home as at our own 
table, we realized what it must have been to this wandering 
Jonathan who had left the hayfields to see the world, in his 
old age, when he was too far advanced in years to adapt 
himself to the circumstances with which he found himself 
surrounded, and to eat the food that was set before him. 



442 ALL ABOARD FOR JERUSALEM. 

He went on to tell us about his experiences. "I did 
kind o' like it in Japan," he confided to us. ''They were 
sort o' smart, and up and comin', and seemed a good deal 
like the Yankees I was used to at home, and I did like them 
jimkirridges that they ride in," he Avent on to say. " You 
mean the jinrikishaws," said his better half, who sat by his 
side. "Yes," he replied, "jimkirridges or jinrikishaws or 
whatever they call 'em, it's all one to me." 

We soon bade good-bye to the rural New Yorker and 
took the first train available for Jerusalem. At the first 
blush it does seem sacrilegious to think of driving through 
the Holy Land behind a snorting locomotive, to have an im- 
pertinent railway ticket thrust into your hatband by a 
jaunty conductor in a Turkish fez, and to steam across the 
sacred valleys and over the sacred mountains, even though 
Ave travel at the alarming speed of fifteen miles an hour. 

HoAveA T er, Avhen the question actually comes as to 
AA T hether one will take tAvo days to make the journe} 7 for the 
sake of indulging a pious sentiment, or will make it in three 
hours, thus gaining more time in the Sacred City, the prac- 
tical man will doubtless decide to postpone his sentimental 
aspirations for a short time, and take advantage of the new 
French railroad which has been constructed from the sea- 
shore almost to the very gate of the Cit}^ of King David. 

I have heard of one man avIio Avas bound not to yield to 
the blandishments of rapid transit, but to nurse his poetic 
sensibilities in solitude as he entered the Holy City, or at 
least with the companionship of his faithful steed alone. 
He would transport himself back to the tAvelfth century as 
far as possible. He Avould enter the city like the Crusader 
of old, riding upon his chosen charger. Though he might 
patronize the railway for a short distance, he Avould abandon 
it before it approached the sacred gates. 



SENTIMENT VERSUS COMFORT. 443 

So when within two stations of Jerusalem, about twelve 
English miles distant, he left the train and the com- 
panions with whom he had journeyed, and hired a horse, 
which proved to be a sorry nag indeed, for the rest of 
the journey. But the skies were unpropitious — they evi- 
dently did not sympathize with his sentiments, for, before he 
had gone a mile, black clouds covered the face of the 
heavens, the sun retired from view and the rain descended in 
torrents. Though wet to the skin there was nothing to do 
but to plod on over the steep and rocky roads. He could 
not spur his jaded steed to any greater exertion, and he ar- 
rived, wet and bedraggled, with all the sentiment soaked out 
of his system, some three hours after his more unpoetic 
companions^ who stuck to the railway, had reached Jeru- 
salem. 

On the day that we took this famous railway ride our 
fellow-passengers consisted of some half-dozen Americans, as 
many more Englishmen, a few hilarious Turks, who had 
been breaking their temperance pledge by indulging in 
strong waters, and one or two fat and unctuous priests. 

But most picturesque of our fellow-passengers was Ab- 
dallah, the dragoman, who was taking some of our fellow- 
passengers to their hotel. Alert, keen, quick-witted, he was 
a typical Syrian in every feature and characteristic. 
Around his head was a beautiful purple silk kaphileh, while 
over his shoulders was a loose flowing garment of fine text- 
ure, shot through and through with silver threads, the envy 
and despair of most of the ladies in the car. 

A common saying in the East is, "A Greek will get the 
better of ten Europeans, a Jew will beat ten Greeks, an 
Armenian will equal ten Jews, and a Syrian is more than a 
match for a Greek, Jew, and Armenian together." We 
could well understand this saying as we looked at this keen, 

27 



444 



ABDALLAH, OUR DRAGOMAN. 



-^S'k 



self-reliant, ready dragoman, who had the history, geogra- 
phy, and archaeology of Palestine at his tongue's end. 

At least he had enough of it to answer his purpose and 
to make himself quite indispensable to the party who placed 

themselves under his guid- 
ance. What he did not know 
about the land through which 
Ave journeyed was evidently 
not worth knowing, in his 
opinion, and he managed to 
impress the same idea upon all 
of us who listened to him. 

Pointing out of the win- 
dow, as the train drew a little 
beyond the station at Jaffa, 
he said, " There is the place 
where Samson tied the foxes' 
tails together and let them 
loose in the standing corn. 
And there, just over the hill, 
is the land of the Philistines," 
he informed us, with the ut- 
most confidence in his own 
geographical accuracy, what- 
ever doubt explorers and 
scholars might feel in their 
own conclusions. 

As he spoke he imparted 
his confidence to all the party, and we could almost see a 
muscular Goliath showing his shaggy head above the hill-top. 
" Over yonder," he went on to say, " is the place where 
the moon stood still in the Valley of Aijalon." " Ah," said 
we to ourselves, " now we have got you, Mr. Dragoman," 




ABDALLAH, OUR DRAGOMAN. 



LILIES OP THE FIELD. 445 

and half a dozen voices spoke ont with the gleeful assurance 
of boys who have caught their professor napping ; " Oh, 
Abdallah, you have made a mistake this time, it was the sun 
that stood still, and not the moon." But Abdallah was more 
than a match for the professors and the ministers who sought 
to correct him, for, whipping out a pocket Bible, he turned 
at once to the passage and read from the twelfth verse of the 
tenth chapter of Joshua : " Then spake Joshua to the Lord 
in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before 
the children of Israel. And he said in the sight of Israel, 
Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou, Moon, in the 
Valley of Aijalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon 
stayed, until the nation had avenged themselves of their ene- 
mies." Evidently, Abdallah had the Book on his side and 
there was nothing for the Reverend Divines to do but to 
subside and to look more dignified than they felt. 

For the first few miles out of Jerusalem the railway runs 
over smiling, cultivated fields, green when we saw them with 
the rich verdure of springtime, and gay with the rose of 
Sharon, for this is none other than the celebrated land of 
Sharon of Bible times. Another brilliant flower which is 
found in the utmost profusion, is the scarlet anemone, 
called in Matthew, " the lily of the field," of which Christ 
said : " Behold the lilies of the field, how they grow, for 
they toil not, neither do they spin, and yet I say unto you, 
that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of 
these." 

At the infrequent stations where the train stopped, mak- 
ing up for their infrequence, however, by a long stop at every 
station, the passengers would get out and pluck great hand- 
f uls of these beautiful flowers. Then the dapper little con- 
ductor with his red fez, and the inevitable cigarette in his 
mouth, would wave his hand and off would start the train 



446 OVER THE MOUNTAINS OF PALESTINE. 

across other historic scenes whose very thought filled our 
hearts with emotions which cannot be recorded, as we remem- 
bered that we were in the land of David and Solomon and 
Samuel and Joshua, and that we were approaching the city 
whose rough pavements had been pressed by the feet of our 
blessed Lord and Saviour. 

A few miles from Jaffa the railway begins to ascend a 
steep and rugged mountain side, and for the rest of the 
journey it climbs over the hills and rumbles through rocky 
chasms that would not discredit the heights of the Rockies 
or the Sierra Nevadas themselves. Even where railways are 
common, this rock-built roadway, twisting around the base 
of perpendicular crags, and toiling by slow approaches over 
the flanks of inhospitable mountains, would be considered no 
ordinary feat of engineering ; there in this land of oppression 
and hopelessness, any such enterprise is truly marvelous. 

When we remember that thirty years ago there was no 
wheeled vehicle of any kind in Palestine ; when we remember 
not only the engineering difficulties, but the governmental 
obstacles which were thrown in the way of this railroad, and 
the innumerable petty hindrances which it met, our only 
marvel is, that its projectors persevered, and that now the 
modern locomotive and railway train rumble up to the very 
walls of the City of David. 

JSTot only France, but England, Germany, Sweden, and 
Italy, as well as Syria and Turkey, were represented in 
some part of the construction or equipment of this road; 
while America is not left out, for engines from the Baldwin 
Locomotive "Works rumble up these steep grades, and shriek 
with their shrill whistles at every dangerous crossing. 

Thus, each one among the cosmopolitan list of passengers 
who daily patronize this road, may feel that he has some 
especial interest in its welfare. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

"JERUSALEM, JERUSALEM"— OUR SOJOURN IN THE LAND 
OF SACRED STORY — INTERESTING SCENES AND TOUCH- 
ING MEMORIES. 

The Brakeman's Announcement — Incongruous Modernism — Entering 
Jerusalem — Thronging Emotions — ' ' The Joy of the Whole Earth " — 
A Walk within the Walls — The Modern City — A Pathetic Story — 
Plunging into the Heart of the City — The Various Shops — Silverware 
from Damascus — Shy lock in Jerusalem — A Suggestion of White-Caps 
— The Camel and His Sneering Underlip — The Dignified Syrian — The 
Church of the Holy Sepulchre — A Checkered History — The Stone 
of Unction — A Touching Bible Story — Measuring the Stone for Their 
Winding Sheet — Our Lord's Tomb — The Great Unwashed — How 
Adam Came to Life — The Cleft in the Rock — An Impressive Spec- 
tacle — A Disgraceful Easter Scene — An Awful Accident. 




ERUSALEM, Jerusalem," cries out 
the railway guard, aucl amid the 
noise and bustle that always sur- 
rounds a station, the cracking of 
whips of the impatient cab-drivers, 
the snorting of the locomotives 
that run back and forth, making 
up their empty train, the trundling 
of trucks, and the tumbling about 
of baggage, we have our first intro- 
duction to the Holy City. 

Could anything be more incon- 
gruous? is our first thought, and we are inclined to wish 
that we had followed the example of our friend of whom I 
wrote in the last chapter, and had ridden into Jerusalem 
more as the Master of old rode into the city, even though it 

(447) 



448 A FURROW ON THE LANDSCAPE. 

might be under lowering skies and in drenching rain. How- 
ever, these are only the passing thoughts of the anxious trav- 
eler who is naturally solicitous for his trunk and his valise, 
his bandbox and his bundle, and who knows not what sort of 
lodging may await him at his journey's end. 

After all, Jerusalem cannot be dwarfed or diminished by 
any such scenes of modern bustle and commotion. There 
stands the city proudly on its hills as of yore. It has with- 
stood the decay of centuries, the tramp of conquering armies, 
the vandalism of the Saracen, and the destruction that comes 
in the wake of war and pestilence and conquest. How can 
it be affected then by this puny invention of the nineteenth 
century ? The much boasted railway makes but a scratch on 
the side of the eternal hills. Viewed from a little distance, 
it seems to turn but a single furrow on the vast landscape, 
which is as wide as the horizon on either side. The wearied 
train that crawls slowly up the hills looks like a mere speck 
when viewed from the walls of Jerusalem — a fly upon the 
nose of the Sphinx, a beetle on the face of the pyramids. It 
does not affect the real life of Jerusalem. 

The railway stops short, and it is well that it should, a 
good mile from the city, and, getting into rickety carriages, 
which have evidently done duty in some more civilized com- 
munity, we have come at last to our hotel at the gates of the 
most famous city in the world. I do not envy the man 
whose heart does not beat a little faster, and whose pulses do 
not thrill as he approaches the Jaffa gate and sees the Tower 
of David rearing its massive head above the time-stained 
walls of the city. As he remembers all that has occurred 
within those walls ; as he calls to mind that here David sang 
and Solomon held his court ; that here the Queen of Sheba 
was obliged to declare, as she looked on all the treasures that 
had been gathered together, that the half had not been told 



"beautiful for situation." 451 

her of the riches that were heaped within those walls ; as he 
remembers the prophets who here spoke the warning words 
of God, of Nehemiah who reared again the prostrate walls, 
of the people who worked willingly, sword in one hand and 
trowel in the other, to bring back the ancient glory to the 
deserted city ; above all, as one remembers the Divine trag- 
edy that was here enacted of the trial, the scourging, the 
indignities and cross-bearing of the Son of God ; he must be 
dull and insensate, indeed, who looks on Jerusalem for the 
first time unmoved. 

But even were there here no supreme historical associa- 
tions for the Christian, Jerusalem would even be an interest- 
ing city. Even then would the sentiment of the Psalmist be 
true, that she is beautiful for situation, even if not at present 
the joy of the whole earth. Imagine a bare and rocky 
plateau, thickly studded with stone houses, and surrounded 
to the very edge, where it dips off into the steep valley, by a 
high wall. On all sides imagine bleak, gray, granite hills, 
overtopping the plateau. Imagine between these distant 
hills and this little table-land on which we are standing, 
black and cavernous valleys, the upper and lower pools of 
Gihon on one side, the valley of Jehoshaphat on another, 
running into the valley of the Kedron to the east. Every- 
where imagine bare, precipitous hills, scowling rocks denuded 
of all soil and vegetation, gray and forbidding but majestic 
in their very barrenness, and you have a picture, drawn very 
imperfectly and rudely, to be sure, but giving some rough 
idea of modern Jerusalem. 

In ancient days there was doubtless much more here to 
make the heart glad. The hills were covered with smiling 
vineyards, terraces rising tier above tier on the hillside 
afforded standing ground for corn and grain and various 
vegetation; frequent villages dotted the hillsides and the 



452 PROUD, EVEN IN DECAY. 

valleys ; and, in every way, the country showed that it was 
not unworthy of the eulogies pronounced upon it, the land of 
milk and honey, of corn and wine, and of everything that 
typified prosperity. 

But the feet of trampling armies have done their work, 
the oppression of tyrannical governments and the gradual 
decay of national spirit have reduced the land to a poverty- 
stricken dependency of the Sublime Porte. The mighty are 
fallen, indeed, but with all these changes, political, industrial, 
and agricultural, Jerusalem still rears its proud head among 
the surrounding valleys, and even in its decay and ruin tells 
every passing traveler what a lordly city it used to be. 

From without nothing could be prouder or grander than 
this city of the kings ; from within nothing could well be 
meaner or more beggarly. Let us enter by the Jaffa gate. 
Even when well within the walls we are not transported 
back to the early centuries by sudden leaps or bounds, for 
the first sign that stares us in the face is that of the Prince 
of Dragomans, Thomas Cook, whose name, it is safe to say, 
is more familiar than that of any other man in the far East. 
Then our eyes rest upon a modern hotel, which even in this 
ancient city rejoices in the name of " The New Hotel." In 
the stores beneath this hotel and on the streets adjoining are 
various shops where all kinds of articles of olive wood are 
sold, — candlesticks and inkstands, penholders and book- 
racks, and every possible thing that can be carved or whittled 
out of the beautifully-grained olive tree. Here, too, we find 
dealers in Bethlehem mother-of-pearl, and in Jerusalem 
crosses of silver, in phylacteries and ancient manuscripts, 
and all kinds of bric-a-brac. 

But these places have comparatively little significance or 
attraction for us. As soon as possible we will dive into the 
heart of the citv and see Jerusalem as it is. 



THE ANCIENT FORTRESS — THE MODERN CITY. 453 

First, however, let us get a little idea of the history of 
this most famous city of all the ages. It will be remembered 
that the city is built on the ancient frontier line between 
Juclah and Benjamin, and for many years before it was made 
the capital of Judea by the conquest of David, it was a 
strong fortress of the ancient Canaanites. Some have sup- 
posed that it was a very large city even before David's time ; 
but it is altogether probable that it was only one of the 
many mountain fortresses that were found in different parts 
of Palestine, and which were used as places of refuge in the 
stormy times that prevailed. 

But the conquest of the city by David and its magnificent 
enlargement and embellishment by Solomon made it "the 
joy of the whole earth," and this, in a religious sense, it has 
continued to be to millions of devout hearts, in spite of sieges, 
wars, famines, and manifold disasters. 

The modern city may be said to date from the time of 
the Crusades, for the principal streets are the same now as 
in the Twelfth Century. They are arched over in many 
places, and the markets and parts of the Yia Dolorosa are 
completely covered. There are now four quarters, of which 
the Mohammedans occupy the northeast, the Jews the 
southeast, the Armenians the southwest, and the Christians 
the northwest ; the most disreputable, uncleanly of all being 
the Jewish quarters. For many years the population 
steadily decreased until, in 1838, but 11,000 people re- 
mained. Now, however, within the walls and without, 
there are some 47,000 people, of whom 27,000 are Jews. 
Comparatively small as is the Jewish population in this 
spiritual capital of Judaism, it is far larger than in former 
years, and at the present rate of increase it is only a matter 
of time before the cry, " Jerusalem for the Jews," will be 
something more than an empty sentiment. 



454 JERUSALEM AT THE EASTER FESTIVAL. 

A pathetic story tells us that six hundred years ago there 
were not Jews enough in Jerusalem to make up an audience 
for a synagogue meeting, which, according to their law, re- 
quires ten persons, and when in despair the nine forlorn 
strangers came together in the home-land of their fathers, 
wailing and lamentation was heard because there were not 
enough of them in the once proud city to conduct the service 
according to their usual form. Just at this juncture, when 
their depression and sorrow was at its height, the tradition 
goes on to say that Elijah appeared, making the tenth per- 
son in the company, and at the same time making the meet- 
ing possible. 

At certain periods of the year the population is very 
largely increased by visiting pilgrims, several thousands of 
whom come, especially at Easter time, to worship in the 
sacred city. On this occasion, as has been said by a traveler 
who recently visited the city at the time of this great 
festival : " The streets of Jerusalem present a strange spec- 
tacle from the numerous national costumes seen together. 
The European tourists, the Turkish nizam, the hooded Ar- 
menian, the long-haired Greek monk, are mingled with the 
native peasants in yellow turbans and striped mantles, with 
Armenian pilgrims wearing broad red sashes, Jews in 
Oriental costume or with the fur cap and lovelocks of the 
Pharisee, Russians in knee boots and padded robes, and 
native ladies in white mantles and black veils. The 
architecture of the city, Oriental, Gothic, Byzantine, or 
Italian, tells the same story — that Jerusalem has been for 
eighteen centuries a holy city in the eyes of Jew, Christian, 
and Moslem alike, and the religious center of half the 
world." 

But let us plunge into the heart of the city, not at Easter- 
tide when it has on its holiday attire, but on an ordinary day 



THE CITY'S EVERYDAY ASPECT. 



455 



of the year, when Jerusalem, so to speak, is in its working 
clothes, and very dirty working clothes they are. The 
narrow streets are filled with rubbish and dirt which, after 
a soaking rain, render them almost impassable. The narrow 




BEGGING DERVISHES, JERUSALEM. 

side streets are worse still, for garbage of every kind, cats, 
dead and alive, goats, cattle, and donkeys make locomotion 
anything but a luxury. 

If not a luxury, however, a walk through Jerusalem is at 
least full of absorbing interest. Some of the streets, as has 
been said, are completely roofed over, and the traveler feels 



456 STREET SCENES IN THE HOLY CITY. 

that he is walking through a continuous market-place, with 
little stalls on either side for the sale of an almost unimao-in- 
able variety of goods. Amber beads occupy one stall, and a 
hundred strings hanging from the roof and dangling from 
the sides tempt to a purchase the lover of this beautiful sub- 
stance. Next, perhaps, is a shop filled with old shoes in all 
varieties of dilapidation, which were Avorn out ten years ago 
and have never seen blacking-brush since the day they were 
made. Next to this is the cavernous den of a baker, with 
his glowing oven in the rear, from which he pulls out every 
now and then, with a wooden shovel, a long cake of dirty- 
looking bread, which he piles up on the counter before him 
like so much cordwood cut into three-feet lengths. 

Next to the baker a dealer in incense has his shop, for the 
incense merchant is an important personage in Jerusalem. 
His wares come in cakes and sticks and broken nuggets, and 
.are of all varieties of flavor and spiciness. Next we see a 
dealer in crucifixes and religious emblems, and horrible 
pictures of the Sacred Heart. Still another shop is devoted 
to rosaries ; and strings of beads of every variety and com- 
plexion and substance of which beads can be made are 
displayed for sale. Then comes a butcher's shop, possibly 
with a grinning and bloody calf's head protruding over the 
doorway, as a sign of the goods that are kept within. 

Here, too, are the dealers in the beautiful Bethlehem 
mother-of-pearl work, in silver ware of Damascus, and in- 
numerable shops where articles carved from olive wood may 
be purchased. At every street corner is the money-changer 
with his little pile of gold and silver and copper before him, 
ready to turn your napoleons or pounds into chereks and 
mejidieh at a most ruinous discount, for Slrylock has his own 
home here in Jerusalem, and will always take his pound of 
flesh if he can get it. 



THE PASSING CROWD. 457 

As we walk along the streets the passers-by are quite as- 
interesting as the shops on either hand. Here comes a lordly 
Kavass, gorgeous in his red and yellow kafileh, who carries 
off his startling costume with the utmost dignity. 

There are few people in the world who can stand so much 
barbaric ornamentation as the Syrian Kavass without betray- 
ing self-consciousness. Behind the Kavass, perhaps, is a 
veiled beauty robed in white from top to toe, with only her 
black eyes peering out from under the rim of her head gear. 
Sometimes she wears a black mask of some thin material 
drawn closely over her face, through which she can see, but 
behind which she is utterly invisible to prying eyes that may 
look upon her. 

In any other city it would be startling to see these white- 
robed, black-masked creatures suddenly turn a corner upon 
the unsuspecting traveler. He almost imagines that he is in 
the land of the " white caps," and that the masks mean mur- 
der and robbery and all kinds of personal violence. But the 
maskers noiselessly glide away without offering to molest 
the quietest of travelers. Behind them, perhaps, comes a 
beggar with a tale of woe not only committed to heart, but 
often written on his dirty, repulsive features as well. 

There are, of course, no wheeled vehicles within the walls, 
for the narrow streets would not admit of such carriages. 
All the loads are carried by donkeys or camels, or on the 
brawny backs of men and women. Often we meet a donkey 
scarcely bigger than a Newfoundland dog, with a big Turk 
or Jew sitting far back, almost on its very tail, while the 
man's feet nearly drag on the ground at every step. These big 
feet he keeps swaying back and forth, and at every move of 
the poor little animal his cruel heels dig into the donkey's 
side and urge him to further exertion. 

The camels naturally have the right of way in these nar- 



458 



CAMELS AND WATER CARRIERS. 



row roads. Their huge bulk preoccupies the whole street. 
The donkeys have to make themselves small in side passage- 
ways, while pedestrians flatten themselves against the wall 
on either side as best they can and let the splay-footed ship 
of the desert, with his sneering under lip and nose high in 
air, showing contempt for every smaller creature, pass through 
at his leisure. 

Behind the beggars and the camels often come the water- 
carriers, their goat-skins almost 
bursting with a dirty liquid 
supposed to be water, and that 
drips upon the ground from 
every tiny crevice. Add to 
these objects, sheep and many 
dogs, and children, lying pro- 
miscuously about the streets in 
every dirty doorway, and crowd- 
ing everv side allev from wall 
to wall, and } t ou have some idea 
of Jerusalem in its everyday 
apparel. 

After all is said there is 
something dignified and impres- 
sive about many of the people 
whom we meet in the streets, 
for the Syrian, though indolent 
and deceitful, is polite and gen- 
tlemanly at the same time. When he meets you and 
desires a word, he will lay his right hand on his forehead, 
lips, and head, for a moment, which means, in the expressive 
symbolism in the country, " in thought, word, and deed, I 
am your servant." If he wishes to show special respect, he 
will stoop clown and then raise his right hand over his head, 




A WATER CARRIER. 



SACRED ASSOCIATIONS. 459 

which means that he is casting dust and ashes over himself 
as a mark of humility. But he does all this with such a 
gracious and dignified air that, servile as are its symbols, he 
seems to be doing himself an honor quite as much as the one 
to whom he speaks. 

Now let us view the people of Jerusalem at their worship, 
for in the churches we find the chief characteristics of the 
Holy City underscored and accentuated. 

The first church to which almost every traveler wends 
his way, is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and here are 
crowded together more traditions, relics, and sacred associa- 
tions than in any place of similar size in the world. Not 
that the traditions are for the most part trustworthy, not 
that the sacred associations are really associated with sacred 
facts ; not that the relics are free from suspicion as to their 
genuineness, but despite all this doubt and uncertainty, the 
very fact that devout souls of many nations, however mis- 
taken and superstitious, have here fed their faith and rever- 
ence for generations past, make it in some sense a holy 
place to those who come after them in succeeding years. 

Whatever may be the absolute facts in the case, and they 
are very difficult to determine, millions of devout hearts have 
believed that under the roof which covers the Church of the 
Sepulchre is the spot where our Lord was crucified, the 
very stone on which he was laid for burial, the new tomb of 
rock in which He was placed when He descended into hades, 
the stone on which He sat when He was crowned with 
thorns and scourged with thongs, and the stocks in which 
His feet were thrust during the cruel night of trial. 

Every other sacred tradition which could find lodgment 
has been crowded into this one spot, even to the tomb of 
Adam himself, which is located here. 

To be sure, it is altogether probable that the place of 



460 THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE. 

crucifixion was nearly half a mile away, outside the walls of 
the present city. The sacred places and relics within the 
church rest upon a very shaky tradition, to the effect that 
Helena, the mother of Constantine, had a dream that here 
she should find the true cross. Causing her servants to dig- 
in the place the dream indicated, she found not one cross, but 
three, one of which spoke to her, and by this token, she knew 
that it was the true cross. 

On this poor and meagre soil, which bears upon its very 
face the marks of its untrustworthiness, are the traditions of 
the sacred place built, and yet they have been hallowed 
by the faith, the prayers, and tears, and rapturous joy of 
myriads of pilgrims. 

It is very sure that near this place, if not upon this actual 
site, our Lord suffered and bled and died. These monu- 
ments which are here erected give the eye of faith something- 
visible to behold, and the heart something tangible to cling- 
to, and, if one can but prevent his reverence from degener- 
ating into superstitious awe, his soul will surely be blessed 
by a visit to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. 

One thing is certain, a sumptuously decorated church was 
erected here in the early part of the fourth century, and even 
then it was supposed to cover the Holy Sepulchre. 

Many ups and downs, destructions, and rebuildings have 
come to this famous church. In 614 it was destroyed by the 
Persians. It was immediately rebuilt and was over and over 
again destroyed or greatly damaged by the Moslems. In 
1099, the Crusaders entered the church, and what a pictur- 
esque sight it must have been when, barefooted and ragged, 
but bearing crowns of palms and uttering songs of praise, in 
the last year of the eleventh century which had seen such 
heroic struggles to regain the holy city, they inarched in 
under the dome of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. 



VIGILANT TURKISH GUARDS. 461 

As can be easily imagined, they were not content with 
the meagre little church which they found guarding the 
holy tomb, so they enlarged it and beautified it and built 
many chapels around it. 

A century later the Arabs nearly destroyed the buildings 
once more. 

Again the warriors of the Third Crusade rebuilt it. 

Fifty years later it was again destroyed, only to be 
rebuilt during the next half century. Thus it met with 
many fluctuations of fortune, good and bad, until, in 1808, it 
was entirely burned down, the dome fell in and crushed the 
chapel and almost nothing was saved except the east wing- 
of the building. But two years later the Greeks and Ar- 
menians erected a new church, which is substantially the one- 
which we are now to visit. 

As we enter, the first persons whom we see are not the 
pilgrims who have come from all parts of the world to do- 
honor to- their Lord, but the Turkish guards who have? 
charge of the place, and we are sadly reminded of the fact 
that the Greek and Latin and Armenian Christians cannot 
be trusted to live together in unity, even within sight of the 
place of their Lord's supreme sufferings, but must be kept 
from knocking each other's heads and cutting each other's 
throats by a cordon of Mohammedan custodians, who are 
never able to relax their vigilance lest the Christians come 
to blows. 

The first sacred object that we see is the stone of unction 
or anointment on which the body of Jesus is said to have 
been laid when it was anointed by Mcodemus. 

Let us recall the pathetic story. "After this" (after 
our Lord's death) says the Sacred Narrative, "Joseph 
of Arimathea being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear 
of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the 

28 



462 WHERE THE BODY OF JESUS WAS LAID. 

body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him leave. He came, there- 
fore, and took the body of Jesus, and there came also Xico- 
demus, which at first came to Jesus by night, and brought a 
mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pounds 
weight. Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in 
linen cloths with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to 
bury." 

How often in imagination we have seen this pathetic 
picture when just at twilight beside the new rock tomb these 
two secret disciples of Jesus came to do their last reverence 
to Him whom in life they loved but never dared to own. 

They were both noted men and members of the San- 
hedrim They both recognized in Jesus the spotless Lamb of 
God. Their hearts had been touched by His holy life and by 
His gentle words, but not until He died for them and for all 
the world were they willing to acknowledge their secret 
faith. But then they came together, neither apparently 
knowing of the other's intention, to bury Him who had re- 
ceived such scant reverence in His life. And this was the 
spot at wdiich tradition and the belief of innumerable eccles- 
iastics said they met. And here on this stone over which 
are burning many gold and silver lamps, the} r reverently 
laid His body. 

To be sure it detracts from our interest somewhat to be 
told by our guide-book that this stone has often been 
changed and has been in the possession of numerous re- 
ligious communities in succession. In the fifteenth century 
it belonged to the Copts, in the sixteenth to the Gregorians, 
from whom the Latins purchased permissions for 5,000 
piastres to burn candles upon it. The present stone, this 
same hard-hearted guide-book goes on to say, is of reddish 
yellow marble, eight and a half feet long, four feet broad, 
and was placed here in 1808. 



THE angel's room. 463 

But what care we for its dimensions to an inch ? Who 
would care to know of its geologic formation? How im- 
pertinent are vulgar facts when we remember that upon 
this stone have fallen the hot tears of hundreds of thousands 
of pilgrims, that it has been passionately kissed by myriads 
of devoted lips, and has received the consecration vows 
of a multitude of devout hearts whose creeds indeed are 
different, but whose love for the supreme Lord never wanes. 

A pathetic touch of interest is added to this stone when 
we remember that formerly pilgrims were in the habit of 
measuring it with a view to having their winding sheets 
made of the same length. 

A few steps to the left of the stone of unction we see a 
small enclosure built around a stone, which is said to mark a 
spot where the women stood and watched the anointing of 
Christ's body. 

As we go on toward the center of the church we come to 
the supreme object of worship, none other than the spot which 
is believed to be the place where our Lord's body lay in its 
rock cavern for three days. Over this spot is erected a 
marble chapel which in some respects is beautiful, but very 
much marred for sober eyes by the amount of tinsel and the 
number of gewgaws that are lavished upon it. 

The first part of the chapel of the Holy Sepulchre is 
called the Angel's Room. In the center is a stone set in 
marble, which our guide solemnly avers is the one which 
the angel rolled away from the mouth of the sepulchre and 
on which he afterwards sat. In this chapel are burning fif- 
teen gold and silver lamps, five of which belong to the 
Greeks, five to the Latins, four to the Armenians, and one to 
the Copts, and the air is thick and heavy with burning in- 
cense and other odors which are more easy to imagine than 
to describe. 



464 INTERESTING BUT ABSURD TRADITIONS. 

But even yet we have not come to the most holy place, 
for, squeezing through a very low and narrow door which is 
merely a hole in the wall, in fact, and through which one has 
to back in a very undignified attitude, we come to the chapel 
of the sepulchre itself. 

This is only about six feet by six and when, crowded with 
half a dozen people, as it always is, it can be imagined that 
even devotion and reverence does not allow one to tarry 
long, since the half dozen other pilgrims besides himself are 
apt to be greasy Russians, dirty Copts, filthy Poles, or un- 
washed Italians. 

All around this central and most sacred chapel are other 
chapels of less significance and holiness, but yet each one of 
which enshrines some interesting tradition. Here, for in- 
stance, is the chapel of Saint Longinus, the soldier who 
pierced Christ's side with his spear. The tradition says that 
he had been blind of one eye, but that some of the water 
and blood from the side of our Lord spurted into his blind 
eye and he recovered sight, whereupon he repented and 
became a Christian. Next is " The Chapel of the Parting of 
the Paiment," whose name indicates the tradition associated 
with it. 

Then " The Chapel of the Crowning with Thorns," where 
the very stone is shown on which Christ sat when the cruel 
thorns were crowded upon His brow. Here, also, are such 
chapels as Saint Maiy, dedicated to the Virgin, the chapel of 
Adam, where tradition says the first man was buried, though 
how his bones came to be transported to Palestine nobody 
seems to know. But no tradition is too wild or absurd for the 
credulous people who cluster here to believe, and they 
solemnly assure us that when Christ was crucified His blood 
flowed through a cleft in the rock on to the head of Adam, 
and he was immediately restored to life. 



THE TRADITIONAL GOLGOTHA. 465 

But as if it was not enough to bury Adam here or to 
invent all kinds of silly traditions about our great forefather, 
they have placed the tomb of Melchizedek here also. We 
have not yet come to the most sacred spot, for the traditional 
Golgotha yet remains to be visited. 

Catholic historians have placed not only the tomb and the 
place of Christ's suffering, but Mount Calvary itself within 
the limits of this sanctuary. It may very naturally be asked 
by the reader how this can be, since the Bible distinctly tells 
us that Christ suffered " without the walls." 

The Papal historian, however, is ready with his answer, 
for he tells us that in the former times the site of this church 
was outside of the second walls of Jerusalem, and that the 
modern walls do not conform to the ancient predecessors. 
This statement, however, must be received with a very large 
interrogation point, and it has been recently proved, all but 
conclusively, by modern scholars, that the present walls 
follow the ancient outlines very nearly, and that the site of 
the church of the Holy Sepulchre could not by any possi- 
bilhVy ever have been found without the walls of the city. 

However, as we said before, this spot has been hallowed 
by the faith of innumerable Christians whose belief was sup- 
ported, at least in ancient times, by very scholarly authority. 
Hundreds of books have been written on the subject to prove 
that this was the veritable spot where our Lord bled, suffered, 
and died, and even the tradition-breaking Protestant need 
not be too eager to disillusionize the world when he comes 
w T ithin these sacred precincts. 

Here in the living rock we see an opening faced with 
silver, where the cross on which our Lord died was said to 
be inserted. Five feet distant on either side are the crosses 
of the two thieves, the penitent thief on the right and the 
impenitent thief on the left. While about the same distance, 



466 THE RIVEN ROCK. 

covered with a brass slide, is the cleft in the rock about 
which Saint Matthew tells us in these solemn words : " Jesus, 
when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the 
ghost ; and, behold the veil of the temple was rent in twain 
from the top to the bottom, and the earth did quake, and the 
rocks rent, and the graves were opened, and man}^ bodies of 
the saints which slept arose and came out of the graves after 
His resurrection and went into the Holy City, and appeared * 
unto many." 

This cleft is said by the superstitious to reach to the very 
center of the earth, although the practical eye of the scien- 
tific man says it is only about six inches deep. 

As I have said, when we visited the Holy Sepulchre it 
was not on a feast day, but on one of the ordinary Sundays 
of the year, and yet it was a strange and striking scene 
which we beheld even then. The whole floor of the church 
seemed to be filled with black-bearded priests in gorgeous 
vestments and jeweled robes, from which the flashing light 
of the innumerable lamps glanced and sparkled. "With 
solemn intonations and measured tread they marched about 
the Holy Sepulchre, slowly waving their golden lamps and 
their jeweled vases, from which the smoking incense curled 
up in dense clouds to heaven. 

Back and forth and around they marched, solemnly 
chanting their dirges, while the wondering crowd, gathered 
from every quarter of the world, looked on in awe-struck 
silence. 

Here were Koords in their sheep-skins, Russians in their 
pilgrim rags, Armenians in their picturesque meal-bag-like 
garments, Greeks in their curious hats and skirts, Europeans 
of every degree of civilization, and Asiatics of every degree 
of barbarism. And yet all were drawn together by a com- 
mon sentiment. 



QUARRELSOME PILGRIMS. 467 

Though they sometimes fall out and fight among them- 
selves like cats and dogs, yet, after all, there is a common 
purpose manifested to honor the common Lord, and to do- 
reverence to Him who died for all the world. "We can 
almost forgive their wranglings and disputings as we see 
the genuine devotion which seems to fill many of the hearts 
that beat under the rough and ragged pilgrim's garb. There 
must be something of good even in the most ignorant and 
suspicious of them all, to bring them on this long and toil- 
some pilgrimage for the sake of doing reverence to Him to 
whom their hearts are blindly reaching out. 

If we have some regard, however, for the pilgrims them- 
selves, we have Very little patience with the priests and relig- 
ious leaders who work on their superstitions and trade on 
their prejudices. 

On Easter are often enacted many disorderly scenes, 
which produce a painful impression when the Church 
of the Sepulchre is crowded with pilgrims of every nation- 
ality, and especially when the so-called miracle of the " holy 
fire " is produced. " On this occasion the church is always 
crowded with spectators," we are told. " It is said that the 
priests besmear the wire by which the lamp is suspended 
over the sepulchre with resinous oil, and that this oil is set 
on fire from the roof. Large sums are paid to the priests by 
those who are the first to be allowed to light their tapers 
from the sacred flame sent from heaven. The wild and 
noisy scene begins on Good Friday. The crowd passes the 
night in the church in order to secure places, some of them 
attaching themselves by cords to the sepulchre, while others 
run round it in anything but a reverential manner. 

" About two o'clock on Easter afternoon a procession of 
the superior clergy moves around the sepulchre, all lamps 
having been carefully extinguished in view of the crowd. 



468 THE DESCENT OF THE SACRED FLAME. 

The patriarch enters the chapel of the sepulchre, while the 
priests pray and the people are in the utmost suspense. 

" At length the fire which has come down from heaven 
gleams from the sepulchre, the priests emerge with a bundle 
of burning tapers and there now follows an indescribable 
tumult, every one endeavoring to be the first to get his taper 
lighted. Even from the gallery, tapers are let down to be 
lighted, and in a few seconds, the whole church is illuminated. 
This however, never happens without fighting, and accidents 
generally occur owing to the crush." 

In 1834 an awful accident occurred. Six thousand peo- 
ple were in the church, when the Turkish guards, thinking 
they were attacked, sprang upon the pilgrims, beat many of 
them to death, and in the scuffle that followed, three hun- 
dred lives were lost. 

Yet, with all these excrescences and unpleasant manifes- 
tations of religious zeal and fanaticism, it must be remem- 
bered that there is something intensely real to all these pil- 
grims in these traditional sights. People do not undergo 
sufferings to see that which they do not believe with intense 
^devotion. They will not fight for that which does not appeal 
strongly to their faith and love, and even the disgraceful 
riots which have blotted the history of the Church of the 
Holy Sepulchre more than once, show the abiding strength 
and dominating influence of the cross of Christ over the lives 
-of the world's millions. 




CHAPTER XXV. 

A MEMORABLE WALK. 

The Via Dolorosa — Fourteen Stations on the Way to the Cross — St. Veron- 
ica and Her Handkerchief — Some Touching Inscriptions — Outside tli3 
Gates — Our Golgotha — " The Green Hill Far Away." Gethsemane — 
The Stone of Treason — A Wonderful View — Our Lord's Broken- 
Hearted Lament — The Russian Tower — The Dead Sea — A Marvelous 
Mirror — Absalom's Tomb — The Fate of an Unfilial Reprobate — TI13 
cave of Adullam — Nebo and Its Lonely Grave — The Village of Mary and 
Martha — ■ The Greatest Miracle of the Ages — ■ " Dis Way to de Tomb 
of Lazaroos" — The Wretched Inhabitants of Modern Bethany — The 
Tomb of Rachel — Where Our Lord was Born — The Marble Cradle — 
An Impressive Sight — Wrangling Christians — Turkish Guards at Our 
Lord's Cradle — A Sad Suggestion. 




NE of the most impressive and 
memorable walks that we took 
within the Holy City led us along 
the Yia Dolorosa, through St. 
Stephen's gate, thence out to the 
Mount of Olives and Bethan}^ 
Before we leave the sacred city, 
let us all take such a walk to- 
gether. 

This traditional " Street of 
Pain " seems worthy of its name, 
for it is a dark and gloomy road- 
way, arched overhead through much of its course with 
vaulted roofs, and reminding one at almost every footstep of 
the suffering and indignities endured by the Son of Man. 
To be sure, the ancient Way of the Cross, even if it fol- 

(469) 



470 



ALONG THE WAY OF THE CROSS. 



lowed the general line of the modern street, which is by no- 
means certain, must have been many feet below the surface 
of the present roadway, for the accumulated rubbish of the 
ages and the many sieges to which Jerusalem has been sub- 
ject have buried the old city from ten to forty feet below the 
modern city 1 . 

However, from very early centuries, the way which our 

Lord took as He bore 
the cross to his own 
crucifixion, has been 
supposed to follow 
the general direction 
of this street. 

Ecclesiastical au- 
thorities have estab- 
lished what they call 
" stations," at points 
which are supposed 
to represent some- 
particular event in 
the sad journey of 
Jesus to the cross. 
There are fourteen of 
these stations in all. 
One of them indicates the spot where Simon of Cyrene took 
the cross from Christ. Another where St. Veronica wiped 
the sweat from our Saviour's brow, the image of his face 
being imprinted on her handkerchief forever afterwards. 
The eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth stations, 
are in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre itself, to which the 
Via Dolorosa leads, and show where our Lord was nailed to 
the cross, where He was taken from the cross, and finally 
where He was laid in the new rock tomb. 




A STREET IN JERUSALEM. 



INSCRIPTIONS ON THE WALLS. 471 

Though they do not add to the authenticity of the events 
recorded, yet the Latin sentences with which many of these 
stations are marked, add a certain dignity and appearance of 
reality to the street. For instance, a tablet on the house 
which is called the House of Pontius Pilate reads as follows : 

Ad Arcum Ecce Homo 
Vbi Pontius Pilatus 
Christum 
Judceis Tradidit ut cruciflgeretur 

A little farther on, a marble slab let into the rough wall of 

the street tells us : 

Locus in quo 
Appreliendit Pilatus Jesum 
et Flagellant. 

While near the outer gate we find the inscription : 

Et Milites Plecentes Coronam 
De Spinis imposuerunt. 

All this sonorous Latin simply tells us the story which in 
simple language we have read a thousand times in the Nine- 
teenth chapter of John, where the beloved disciple tells us 
that " Pilate therefore took Jesus and scourged Him and the 
soldiers platted a crown of thorns and put it upon His head. 
And they put on Him a purple robe, and said, Hail, King of 
the Jews, and they smote Him with their hands. Pilate, 
therefore, went forth again and said unto them, Behold I 
bring Him forth to you that you may know that I find no 
fault in Him. Then came Jesus forth wearing the crown of 
thorns, and the purple robe, and Pilate said unto them, 
Behold the man." 

Now we are not far from the wall of the city, and pass- 
ing out through St. Stephen's gate, which is surrounded by 
cripples, lepers, and beggars in all stages of dilapidation and 



472 THE HILL OF THE CRUCIFIXION. 

disease, we find ourselves in an instant out of the reeking 
streets of the filthy- city in the sunlight and fresh air of 
God's wide country. 

Over there, a little to the left, we see the site upon which 
modern Protestant scholars are largely agreed is the site of 
the crucifixion and burial of Christ. There, indeed, is the 
" green hill far away, without the city wall." There is the 
gently rounding hilltop which might well be called by the 
picturesque and imaginative Orientals " the place of the 
skull." There, underneath this hillside, near to the reputed 
grotto of Jeremiah, is a rock tomb, hewn out of the solid 
stone, a tomb which has never been finished, and which 
answers in every particular to what we might expect of 
Joseph's new tomb. 

Here our imagination is fully satisfied. Here our feelings 
of reverent devotion ask for nothing more. There is no 
gaudy church with its tinsel and its second-rate paintings, its 
mosaics and its incense-scented chapels to distract our minds 
and weary our senses. No quarreling bands of hostile 
Christians, no Moslem guards to keep the peace are here 
required, no gorgeously bedecked priests to distract our 
thoughts from the Man of Sorrows whom they ignorantly 
worship, and whose life of suffering for mankind they, with 
their elaborate ceremonials, obscure rather than illumine. 

Here is nothing over our heads but the blue arch of 
heaven, a few fleecy clouds sailing across it. Under our feet 
is the green grass of springtime, the daisies and the anem- 
ones, the lilies of the valley, and all the flowers of the field 
with which our Lord so often illustrated His discourses. 

To be sure, on this very hill are some Mohammedan 
tombs which at first seem to desecrate our Golgotha, but, as 
we think of it, we remember that if it were not for these 
tombs this hill would doubtless have been covered with 



THE GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE. 473 ; 

buildings and the site entirely lost for many generations 
before modern scholars could have identified it as the spot 
where our Saviour suffered His last agony ; so from this point 
of view we may consider these Moslem tombs a blessing in 
disguise, for wherever a Mohammedan is buried his country- 
men regard it a sacred ground for all the future ages. 

But sweet as are the associations of this hallowed hill we 
cannot always linger here, but must go on down the road 
which leads us across the Yalley of Kedron and then up the 
slopes of the Mount of Olives. 

On the further side of the valley we see a small grove of 
dark and gloomy cypress trees, and, near by, a number of 
gnarled and twisted olive trees. Almost by intuition we say 
to ourselves this must be the Garden of Gethsemane ; and 
so it is. 

This is one of the sacred places about which there is com- 
paratively little dispute. To be sure, the claim of the monk 
who shows us the garden, that these great olive trees with 
trunks "burst from age and shored up with stones" date 
from the time of Christ, may not be true, and it is possible 
that the actual garden which saw the bloody sweat of our 
Lord, and witnessed his agony and arrest may not have been 
upon this very spot ; but, undoubtedly, it was near to this 
spot, and it requires no stretch of imagination to believe that 
the checkered moonlight fell through the branches and 
leaves of these very olive trees on the night when the 
disciples could not keep open their sleepy eyes to watch with 
our Lord " even one hour." 

We can readily believe that at this very spot . which is. 
pointed out to us, marked to-day by the fragment of a stone 
column, the treacherous Judas kissed our Lord, and received 
therefor his thirty pitiful pieces of silver. 

A sharp climb of fifteen minutes brings us to the top of 



474 A SCENE OF SURPASSING BEAUTY. 

the Mount of Olives from the garden of Getlisemane. "When 
about half way up the hill we turn around and the magnifi- 
cent view bursts upon our eyes. There is the Holy City en- 
closed by its four-square walls. There is Jerusalem, "the 
joy of the whole earth." It is builded "as a city which is 
compact together." Its squalidness and wretchedness are no 
longer visible. The tilth of its narrow streets is forgotten. 
Its walls from this distance look indeed like the ramparts of 
Zion. Its churches and mosques dominate it with a lordly 
air, and even its stone houses, which look so mean and 
squalid on near approach, have from this point almost the 
look of palaces as the afternoon sun and the clear air of 
Palestine lend their enchantment to them. 

It is indeed a scene of surpassing beauty, and here, accord- 
ing to one of the best authenticated traditions, our Lord 
.stood when he looked with love and pity upon the sacred 
■city, while the hot tears fell upon his cheeks, as he cried out, 
"If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, 
the things which belong unto thy peace ! " Then his emotion 
overcame him. He could not continue the sentence, but, with 
choking voice, he added, after a momentary pause, as he 
thought of the awful destruction which awaited the beautiful 
city, " But now are they hid from thine eyes. 

" For the day shall come upon thee, that thine enemies 
shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and 
keep thee in on every side. 

" And shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy 
children within thee ; and they shall not leave in thee one 
stone upon another ; because thou knewest not the time of 
thy visitation." 

But now we will turn our eyes upward and climb the 
Mount of Olives once more. In a few moments we find our- 
selves upon its very summit. 



UPON THE MOUNT OF OLIVES. 475 

The highest point of the hill is 2,723 feet above the sea 
level, so that by ordinary geographical measurements it is 
no slight elevation, but deserves the name of mountain. 
When compared with the neighboring city of Jerusalem, 
however, it is not a lofty hill, for it rises but 196 feet higher 
than the temple plateau which we recently visited, and 
where now is found the mosque of Omar. 

For many centuries the Mount of Olives has been con- 
sidered the spot from which Christ ascended into Heaven, 
but Luke seems to contradict this idea, for he tells us that 
He led them out "as far as Bethany and lifted up His hands 
and blessed them. And it came to pass while He blessed 
them that He was parted from them and carried up into 
Heaven." Now Bethany is a good half mile on the other 
side of the Mount of Olives. However, if this is not the 
place of the ascension of Christ, the Mount of Olives has 
sufficient historical and sacred attractions to satisfy the most 
exacting, and the view from the top is one of the most 
magnificent and attention-compelling which can be found in 
any part of the world. 

The Russians have built a high tower on the very crest 
of the hill whose top is reached by a narrow, winding stair- 
case. It is a hard climb which takes us to the top of this 
bell tower, but it well repays us for our trouble. Surely 
from no spot in the world can be seen so much of lasting 
and touching interest to all mankind. 

Hour after hour can we spend on the top of this tower 
and still find food for our imaginations, stimulus for our 
highest religious aspirations, and memory photographs 
which never fade, of sacred historical sights such as no other 
view in the world can give. To the west is the view of the 
Holy City which we have already seen at the point where 
Christ our Lord wept over it, only it is more magnificent 



476 JORDAN AND THE DEAD SEA. 

still from this high perch which we have attained. Beyond 
stretches the land of Judah and the land of Benjamin, run- 
ning into the country of the Philistines, which borders the 
seacoast towards Jaffa. 

To the east is an entirely different scene, but one scarcely 
less striking. Deadness and sterility, a treeless and appar- 
ently uninhabited waste greets the eye. These are the hills 
of Moab in the far distance, and there, just this side of these 
mountains, a silver ribbon which glances and glitters in the 
sunlight, shows us where the rippling waters of the Jordan 
are making their way to the Dead Sea, which looks in the 
afternoon sunlight like a huge mirror lying at the base of 
the frowning mountains of Moab. 

It is impossible to believe that we cannot reach this sea 
of glass by a walk of an hour, or at the most of two hours, 
across the hills and valleys that lie between us and it, and 
when we are told that it is a hard horseback ride of full 
seven hours over barren and uninhabitable hills, and that 
that strip of looking-glass is almost four thousand feet below 
our present altitude, we are still more surprised, but we 
are obliged to take the word of geographers, surveyors, and 
travelers who have actually made the distance, rather than 
our own unauthenticated impressions. That little lake, 
gleaming in the sunlight, is none other than the Dead Sea, 
one of the most extraordinary bodies of water in all the 
earth. It has no outlet, as is well known, but the lake is 
kept at its present level by the evaporation of the sun, 
w T hich day after day sucks up thousands of tons of water 
from this intensely hot hole in the surface of the earth. 

The dimensions of the sea and its volume of water are 
constantly growing smaller and its density is growing 
greater. No fish can swim in its briny waves, but few birds 
flit along its barren shores, and the traveler who takes a 



WHERE SHEPHERDS WATCHED THEIR FLOCKS." 477 



morning bath in its heavy waters finds that he cannot sink, 
and that when he comes out he is covered by a saline in- 
crustation, which makes him think that he may possibly be a 
relative of Lot's unfortunate wife. 

Off to the north 
we can catch a 
glimpse of Bethle- 
hem and the plains 
where the shep- 
herds kept their 
flocks by night, and 
where they heard 
out of the blue 
heavens the gloria 
in excelsis. 

Just at the foot 
of the hill, but out 
of sight because it 
is so near, is the 
little town of Beth- 
any, which we re- 
member as the 
place that of all 
others Christ loved 
the best. 

On the other 
side of the hill 
toward Jerusalem, 
also hidden by its 
very nearness, is the Olive Garden of Gethsemane which 
we have just visited, and the reputed tomb of Absalom, at 
which every devout Jew throws a stone as an indication of 
his detestation of filial impiety. It is said that this tomb is 

29 




ABSALOM S TOMB. 



478 THE VALLEY OF JEHOSHAPHAT. 

the same one spoken of in Second Samuel : " Now Absalom 
in his lifetime had taken and reared up for himself a pillar 
which is in the king's dale, for he said, I have no son to keep 
my name in remembrance, and he called the pillar after his 
own name, and it is called unto this day Absalom's place." 

If this is indeed the tomb which Absalom built it has 
served its purpose better than he perhaps intended, for while 
it has preserved his name it has at the same time preserved 
it as the name of an ungrateful, heartless, reprobate son, the 
scorn and derision of every one who passes by, and none can 
express their contempt in any way more striking than by 
flinging a derisive stone at the pillar which its builder fondly 
thought would keep his name in grateful remembrance. 

Here near by, also, is the tomb of Jehoshaphat and St. 
James, and all the monuments and memories which crowd 
so full the Y alley of Jehoshaphat. Not far away is the hill 
of Herod, as it is called, and, underneath, the cave of Adul- 
lam, where three thousand years ago David collected "every 
one that was in distress, and every one that was in debt, and 
every one that was discontented, and became a captain over 
them," and formed them into the nucleus of what was after- 
wards his conquering and irresistible army. 

As we look far off towards the south we see the hilltop 
Mizpeh where Samuel judged the Children of Israel, and 
where he won such a signal victor}'- over the Philistines, for 
here we are told, "And as Samuel was offering up the burnt 
offering, the Philistines drew near to battle against Israel: 
but the Lord thundered with a great thunder on that day 
upon the Philistines, and discomfited them; and they were 
smitten before Israel. 

" Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh 
and Shen, and called the name of it Eben-ezer, saying, 
Hitherto hath the Lord helped us. 



SACRED MEMORIES. 479 

" And Samuel judged Israel all the years of bis life. 

"And he went from year to year in circuit to Bethel, 
and Gilgal, and Mizpeh, and judged Israel in all those 
places." 

Thus our eyes are surfeited Avith wondrous sights and 
our memories are wearied to recall everything that has made 
these places memorable. 

But before we descend from the tower, our eyes sweep 
around once more to the narrow Jordan and the glittering 
Dead Sea, and rest upon the bleak mountains of Moab. 
Among them is one hilltop of surpassing interest. There on 
Mount Nebo, four thousand feet above the Dead Sea which 
lies at its base, the great lawgiver of Israel looked upon 
the Promised Land which he was never to enter. 

Going down the sacred hill toward the east, crossing a 
gentle spur, and following a winding path across flowery 
fields, we come at last to a village which perhaps centers 
within itself more touching sacred memories than any other 
spot in all the region, for in this village was the home of 
Mary and Martha, whose door was so often left ajar for 
Christ to enter. 

Here was the house of Simon the Leper where Mary 
washed the blessed feet that continually went about doing 
good, and wiped them Avith the hairs of her head. Here, 
too, Lazarus lived, and in this little hamlet the greatest 
miracle of the ages was wrought when Lazarus heard the 
Divine voice saying to him in the tomb, " Come forth." 

But alas, the passing centuries have taken all the poetry 
and romance out of this little hamlet. The natural in- 
dolence of the inhabitants, their hopeless lives, for many 
generations ground down under the heel of the Turks, and 
their unenterprising, fanatical disposition, have all contrib- 
uted to make this at the present day as squalid, mean, and 



480 AN OVER-SUPPLY OF GUIDES. 

uninteresting a town as can be found in any one of the five 
continents which we are visiting together. 

As we neared the village we passed a group of ragged, 
filthy, sore-eyed specimens of humanity, squatting on the 
ground near an old, dilapidated tent, where they had been 
lazily basking in the sunshine. They were engaged in the 
interesting task of simultaneously extending their dirty 
hands into the one and only dish that contained their food. 
They stretched out their gaunt, diseased hands to us, crying- 
" backsheesh," the only word, apparently, which they knew 
and which stood for the only thing they cared for. 

"What is Mary or Martha, Lazarus or Simon to them, 
except so many pretexts for extorting more backsheesh from, 
the traveler who comes their way ? What is Christ himself, 
except a personage whose wondrous attractiveness turns 
the feet of many a pilgrim Bethanyward, and gives these 
petty robbers a -chance to practice their arts upon a fresh 
set of travelers every day % 

However, they know the stock places of interest in their 
village by heart, and, starting up from all sides, they run on 
before the pilgrims crying out, " Thees way, thees way to do 
house of Mary and Marrta," rolling their r's with great 
vigor, and vociferating and gesticulating as only Orientals 
can, lest some one else should capture their travelers and 
show them the way. 

"Dis way to de tomb of Lazaroos, dis way to de tomb of 
Lazaroos," cries a shrill treble voice in our ear, as a little 
damsel not more than eight or nine years old came skipping 
over the rough stones, eagerly pressing upon us the fact that 
she will be our guide to the tomb of Mary's brother. 

All that we have to do is to follow the crowd, for all 
Bethany seems ready to act as our guide this morning, and 
every one knows as well as we where we wish to go. 



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THE HOUSE OP MARY AND MARTHA. 



483 



So following our many cicerones we soon come to a 
dilapidated ruin into which we are admitted by a small 
wooden gate. This, we are assured by a chorus of voices, is 
none other than the house of Mary and Martha. We are 
not prepared to dispute the fact, for it is as likely a place for 
the residence of the famous sisters as any in the village. It 
is perhaps a shade more clean and respectable than any 
other ruin in the vicinity, but 
we are very confident that in 
the days of old, Martha left no 
such piles of rubbish and gar- 
bage at her front door as now 
decorate it; that she kept the 
dead cats and live donkeys off 
her premises, and that the blear- 
eyed children who now clamber 
all over her dining-room and 
parlor walls would have been 
obliged to wash their faces and 
comb their hair before she ad- 
mitted them within her doors 
in the days of old. 

The tomb of Lazarus is 
equally disappointing and per- 
haps no more authentic. The 
narrow entrance shows us a long flight of stairs which 
leads us down into the very bowels of the earth, and, here, 
by the aid of a smoky, flaring taper and a vigorous imagina- 
tion we are supposed to see the place where for four days the 
body of Lazarus lay before the Eedeemer's voice put life and 
vigor into the decaying limbs. 

Bethany is decidedly disappointing from every point of 
view, and does not invite us to linger long within its wretched 




A BEDOUIN WOMAN. 



484 



A DISCOURAGED PROPHET. 



streets. Since we stay here so short a time, we can on this 
same day visit Bethlehem, which lies on the other side of 
Jerusalem, about an hour and a half by carriage from the 
gates of the city. 

The road from Jerusalem lies over rocky hills which are 
spotted here and there with little patches of soil, laboriously 
enclosed by rocks, where some scanty crops are raised by 
the primitive agricultural methods of the day. Half-way 











RACHELS TOMB 



out to Bethlehem, Ave see the place where it is supposed 
Elijah lay down under the juniper tree and asked to die. He 
must have lain down with considerable force, one would 
think, for he has left a hole in the solid rock about the size 
of a man's body, which is pointed out as the very spot where 
he threw himself down in his unrighteous despair. 

A little further on we come to the tomb of Rachel, which 
is better authenticated than most historic sites in the vicinity. 
It is a place greatly reverenced, especially by the Jews. 
Fortunately, the custodian of the tomb was there when we 



BETHLEHEM OF SONG AND STORY. 485 

went by, and we enjoyed the privilege which many travelers 
do not have, of entering the tomb and seeing the great rock 
sepulchre in which it is not altogether improbable that the 
beloved wife of Jacob is still resting. 

" And Rachel died," says the sacred narrative, " and was 
buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem. And 
Jacob set a pillar upon her grave ; that is the pillar of 
Rachel's grave unto this day." 

Not many minutes beyond this historic tomb we see a 
long, straggling Eastern village, and our pulses beat a little 
quicker as we remember that this is none other than Bethle- 
hem, Bethlehem of prophecy and of history, Bethlehem of 
song and story, Bethlehem Ephrata, of which it was said 
seven hundred years before our Lord was born, " Though 
thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee 
shall He come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel, 
whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting." 

The town now contains about five thousand inhabitants, 
most of them Christians, but among them only fifty Protes- 
tant Christians. Here, the Latins and Greeks and Armeni- 
ans all possess huge monasteries, and the inhabitants live by 
raising cattle, by making images of saints and fancy articles 
in olive wood, mother-of-pearl, and coral. The one supremely 
interesting spot in this little town is covered by the Church 
of Saint Mary, which is erected over the traditional birth- 
place of Christ. 

Our carriage rattles down through the principal street, 
over the horribly rough pavements which sometimes give out 
altogether, and are only replaced by holes and hummocks 
which threaten to break every spring in the wagon. But 
the driver paid no attention to such little obstacles. He 
wants to show off to the best advantage, and cracking his 
whip and urging on his horses, he flies through the narrow 



486 



THE PLACE OF THE NATIVITY. 



streets, while the inhabitants flatten themselves against the 
walls to escape his threatening wheels. Finally, he brings 
up with a great flourish in front of the aforesaid Church of 
Saint Mary, or, of " The Nativity," as it is usually called. 

Of course the exact sites which are here pointed out are, 
in all probability, spurious. Some of them are manifest 
absurdities, and yet, very near to this spot, and quite proba- 
bly within the space that is 
covered by the roof of this 
church, the Redeemer of Man- 
kind was born. Here we can 
afford to give our imagina- 
tions full play and need not 
try to curb our religious emo- 
tions. 

After passing through a 
church which is grandly sim- 
ple in its design, we come to 
the Chapel of the Nativity 
itself. The pavement is of 
marble and the walls also are 
lined with marble, while under 
the altar a silver star marks 
the place of Jesus' birth. The 
inscription tells us : " Hie de 
Virgine Maria Jesus Cliristus natus est." 

For centuries and centuries, devout hearts have traveled 
hither to worship at the cradle of our Lord, and from the 
time of Constantine this spot has been richly decorated, 
and golden lamps with their undying flame are constantly 
swinging over the silver star. 

Near by is the Chapel of the Manger, where the marble 
cradle of Christ is pointed out to us. It does not meet our 




A GIRL OF JUDEA. 



GUARDING THE CRADLE OF OUR LORD. 487 

ideas, however, of the rough stall from which the horses fed, 
and which Protestant Christians always associate with the 
birth of the Redeemer. 

While we were looking at these relics, twenty -one Fran- 
ciscan monks came into the chapel, carrying huge candles 
and chanting the praises of the Virgin Mary. Behind them 
followed a priest arrayed in most gorgeous vestments, and 
followed by two attendants. As the priest approached the 
place of the Nativity, he took a golden censer in his hand, 
and then from a silver vase he took some powdered incense 
and with a golden spoon sprinkled it on the living coals. 

The fragrant smoke curled up to heaven, while the monies 
chanted, and the priests with rhythmical motion swung the 
golden censer, and the thirty-one lamps of gold and silver 
shed their subdued light upon the scene. But even while we 
looked we could see the grim figure of a Turkish soldier sta- 
tioned beside the marble cradle itself to keep the peace 
between the warring Christian factions. 

How much of the beauty and harmony of the scene was 
dissipated by this soldier's suggestive attitude ! How much 
it told of warfare and bitterness where all should be peace 
and harmony ! How much it suggested even of jealous and 
envious sects who cannot even clasp hands across the cradle 
of our Lord ! 

We were glad before long to leave the Church of the 
Nativity, and, as we rode home, we found more joy and sat- 
isfaction in the sight of the peaceful plains where the shep- 
herds watched their flocks by night, where Boaz left the 
" handfuls of purpose," and where David kept his flocks, de- 
livering them with the help of God out of the paw of the 
lion and out of the paw of the bear, than in the gaudy 
and tinsel-decked church over which quarrelsome Christians 
have spent so much blood and treasure. 



CHAPTEE XXYI. 

WITHIN AND AROUND "THE DOME OF THE ROCK." 

The Mosque of Omar — A Rock of Wonderful Traditions — Abraham's 
Sacrifice — Our Retinue — Mohammed's Broomstick Ride — The Wily 
Jew and the Pilgrim — The AVise Judge — The Marvelous Iron Chain 
of Justice — A Wily Jew — Our Slippers and How We Kept Them On 
— Our "Humbug" Sheik — The Great Rock — The Stone of Nails — 
How the Devil Drew Them Out — An Easy Way of Buying Heaven — 
A Rock Which Rests on Nothing — How Gabriel Held It Down — The 
Way to Paradise — What the Pilgrim Found in the Well — Hairs from 
the Beard of Mohammed — The Stables of Solomon — The Place of 
Final Judgment — Startling and Curious Traditions — The Wailing 
Place — Real Grief — A Squalid Scene — The Old Pharisee and His 
Lovelocks — A Sad Litany — A More Joyful Keynote — A Marvelous 
Race. 




^ERHAPS the mosque of Omar 
combines more of authentic his- 
toric interest than any other one 
place in the world. The Church 
of the Holy Sepulchre, to be 
sure, would be more interesting' 
to the Christian heart than the 
site of the Temple of Solomon, if 
we could put full and implicit 
trust in the rather shady tra- 
ditions which give it its fame. 
But around the holy rock 
over which the mosque of Omar is built few doubts linger. 
We know something of the wonderful temple which once 
overshadowed it. "We know what the rock itself was used 
for, and though in these degenerate days the place has fallen 

(488) 



THE HOLY ROCK. 489* 

into impious Moslem hands, it is still of supreme and pathetic 
interest to Jew and Christian, Catholic and Protestant, Ar- 
menian and Mohammedan alike. 

Even unsentimental Baedeker melts a little when he 
comes to the Haram, as the whole place is called, and says, 
with a suspicion of sympathy in his professional guide- 
book phrase, "We now stand on one of the most profoundly 
interesting spots in the world." 

In Abraham's day the stone under this great dome was 
an altar of sacrifice, and in that most touching of Biblical 
stories we read that God said to Abraham, "Take now thy 
son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee 
into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt 
offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of." 

This was the mountain, so full since then of pathetic but 
blessed memories to Jew and Christian alike, that God told 
Abraham of. 

This, too, was undoubtedly the threshing floor of 
Araunah, the Jebusite, which David bought for fifty shekels, 
of silver, and where he built an altar unto the Lord and 
offered burnt offerings and peace offerings because of the 
plague which Avas devastating Israel. Here, temple after 
temple was erected ; here David collected the vast treasures 
for the magnificent house of worship which he was not per- 
mitted on account of his blood-stained hands to build ; here, 
Solomon, the most exalted monarch of his day, built the 
grandest temple of the ages ; here Nehemiah and his faithful 
compatriots on their return from exile built a less splendid 
house for God's worship ; and here Herod, just before the 
birth of Christ, erected a stately edifice whose stones were 
being laid and whose beams were springing into their places 
even while our Lord walked the streets of Jerusalem. He 
must have watched the growth of the third temple. 



490 AN IMPOSING PROCESSION. 

For many centuries, as all know, Jerusalem has been in 
the hands of Mohammedans, and the temple precincts have 
been their especial treasure. Until within a few years the 
"infidel dogs," as they politely designate all Christians, 
were not allowed to set foot within the enclosure, but the 
waning power of the Sultan could not resist the increasing 
demands of Christian nations, and since the Crimean war, 
travelers have been admitted to the Haram. 

Even now there are some imposing formalities to be gone 
through with before we can visit the sacred mosque. We 
applied to our United States Consul for a permit, and for his 
kavass, who on the payment of five francs from each mem- 
ber of the party accompanies us, to see that no harm befalls 
us from infuriated Moslems who still have to be held in 
check when their sacred places are invaded even by the 
peaceful tourist. We also were obliged to take a soldier to 
defend us in case of attack, who expects a fee of three or 
four francs, a small boy to carry our slippers which must be 
donned before we enter the sacred precincts, while in ad- 
dition to this array of followers, is our guide or dragoman, 
who explains the significance of the sacred sights. 

It was quite an imposing procession which set off one 
bright March morning from the hotel just within the gates 
of the city for the mosque of Omar. Leading the way was 
the gorgeous kavass, arrayed in all his Oriental finery, car- 
rying off his gaudy plumes with the utmost indifference and 
dignity. Then came the soldier guard, scarcely less wonder- 
fully arrayed, whose Winchester rifle, long sword, short 
dirk, and brace of bull-dog pistols, were supposed to strike 
terror to the heart of every pugnacious Turk who might dis- 
pute our passage. 

Following him was Abdallah, our dragoman. Then 
came our modest selves, some half-dozen English and Amen- 



MEMORIES OF THE GREAT FALSE PROPHET. 



491 



cans. Our slipper boy followed after, and, as his only 
function was to put on our shoes when we removed the 
slippers, and guard the shoes while we were in the mosque, 
he was not obliged to appear in uniform. 

Through the narrow, filthy streets we walked, passing the 
Armenian monastery overshadowed by lofty and gloomy 
cypresses, past the Turkish guard who unceasingly stands at 
the gate of the Haram to prevent any unaccredited infidel 
foot from pressing the sacred soil. At last we stood on the 




THE MOSQUE OP OMAR. 

very rocks made sacred by the feet of Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob ; of David and Samuel ; of Judges, Prophets, Apostles, 
and Martyrs, and of Jesus Christ, our Saviour, himself. 

One soon gets the impression, however, that these pre- 
cincts, in the minds of present owners, are more sacred to 
the memory of Mohammed than of any one else, for at every 
step we are reminded of the great false prophet by some 
absurd tradition. 

For instance, as we enter the grounds a spot enclosed by 
marble pillars is shown us as the very spot from which 
Mohammed started on his flying horse to visit Damascus 



492 THE CHAIN OF JUDGMENT. 

and Mecca, a journey of many hundred miles which occupied 
him only five or six minutes. He had evidently anticipated 
not only Darius Green and his flying machine, but all the 
aerial inventions and electrical contrivances of the nineteenth 
century. If he had only left to his devoted followers the 
secret of his airy journey, how many would have called him 
blessed ! The Atlantic would now have no terrors for 
the timid landsman. The Mediterranean might wax never 
so wrathy and yet it would not keep us at home. Even the 
landing at Jaffa would have no fear for us, and traveling in 
Palestine, which is now so wearisome, would be only a joyous 
flitting from sacred spot to sacred spot. 

But, alas ! Mohammed did not reveal the secret of his 
flying horse, and we must still walk about on two feet, be 
they never so weary. 

Before the east entrance to the mosque of Omar is an- 
other covered, dome-shaped pavilion surrounded by marble 
pillars, and here we paused long enough for Abdallah to tell 
ns the story of the place. With his snapping, black Syrian 
eyes, his expressive gestures and mobile face, he could make 
the most untrustworthy and improbable traditions glow with 
a living interest. Suspended from the roof of this pavilion, 
says Abdallah, there used to be a chain of heavy iron links, 
under which all accused persons must stand. If the chain 
fell on them they were guilty ; if, however, the chain did not 
fall, but remained suspended, they were innocent. 

On one occasion there came to this place of judgment a 
Mohammedan and a Jew, the Jew being accused by the 
Mohammedan of robbing him of the gold which he had com- 
mitted to the Jew on his departure for Mecca, whither he 
had gone on a pilgrimage, for it is not permitted a pilgrim 
to carry with him more money than is sufficient to meet the 
necessities of life. 



ABDALLAH'S STORY. 493 

"When I came back from Mecca," said the Mussulman 
at the trial, " this dog of a Jew would not give me back my 
property, but swears that he never received it from me.' 1 

" Stand under the chain," said the just and inflexible 
judge to the Jew, " and if you have your neighbor's money 
its heavy links will fall on you and crush you to the dust." 

" Most willingly," answered the Jew, " for I assure you I 
have not a penny of my neighbor's money." Upon this he 
handed the judge a heavy cane that he carried in his hand 
and briskly stepped under the avenging chain. 

Sure enough, the Jew appeared to be right, the chain 
remained strong and firm, not even by a wriggle of one of 
its links did it show its desire to crush the accused. 

"Ha, ha," said the judge to the Mohammedan, "you 
have borne false witness, you must stand under the chain 
yourself and it will soon show which is the perjured man." 

Upon this the Jew received his cane back again and the 
Mohammedan stepped under the chain, and still it did not 
fall, neither did the links show any motion, or desire to 
avenge a wrong. 

" There must be some mistake about this," pondered the 
judge, " the chain never made a mistake before. Either one 
or the other of these men must be guilty." 

Then a sudden light gleamed upon the mind of the 
sapient dispenser of justice, and, taking the cane once more 
out of the hand of the wily Jew, he broke it across his knee 
and all the Mohammedan's gold rolled out from its hollow 
interior. 

Thus the secret stood revealed. The Jew did not have 
a penny of the Moslem's money while he was under the 
chain, for it was all in the judge's hands, and the chain could 
not fall upon him, neither could it crush the Mohammedan, 
for he was right in his accusation, and thus the wisdom of 



494 SLIPPERS FOR INFIDEL FEET. 

the great judge was re-established and the reputation of the 
chain was preserved. 

It was on this spot, too, according to Abdallah, that 
Solomon discovered the true mother of the babe when he 
took his sword and was about to cut the little one into two 
pieces, and discovered by the heart-rending sobs and prayers 
of one woman that the life of the child might be spared, 
which the true mother of the infant was. 

Here at this east door, near which the pavilion of the 
chain is situated, we stopped to take off our shoes. A most 
miscellaneous assortment of slippers was brought for those 
who had no slippers with them by one of the attendants of 
the mosque. These slippers were in all degrees and stages 
of dilapidation. The only kind that we did not find among 
the whole lot brought us to choose from, were those that 
made any pretention to respectability. Great splay-footed 
sides of leather, out at the toes and heels, were presented to 
us ; equally disreputable pieces of carpeting which were 
once slippers, but which now bear scarcely a resemblance to 
soles and uppers were laid at our feet ; w T hile, in other cases, 
pieces of booking with a string run through the hole at the 
top, into which the feet are supposed to be thrust, did duty 
as foot coverings, and prevented our infidel feet from defil- 
ing the sacred sanctuary of the Moslems. 

The only thing about these slippers which is universal is 
their conspicuous roominess. However, by careful manage- 
ment, never lifting our feet from the ground, and shuffling in 
the most awkward way, we were able to keep them on our 
feet and to follow our guide, our kavass, and our soldier, into 
the mosque. The crowd of attendants was here increased by 
the old sheik of the mosque himself, and by several of his 
retainers who followed us about in order that they might 
have an excuse for demanding backsheesh. 



COMPLIMENTING THE SHEIK. 495 

Our new attendant, the sheik of the mosque, spoke only 
Turkish. Our dragoman, Abdallah, is equally at home in 
Turkish and English. Turning to us he said, with the ut- 
most solemnity, " This sheik is a very great man, I assure 
you, and he greatly honors us with his presence." This 
complimentary explanation he translated into Turkish, and 
then turning to us once more said, in English alone, for our 
own private delectation, " And he is one great big humbug,, 
too, and no more use to us than two tails to a cat." 

The sheik evidently considered this another compliment, 
but fortunately, did not insist upon its being translated. 

The mosque of Omar, or dome of the rock, as its Turkish 
name may be translated into English, is an octagonal build- 
ing, each of whose sides is sixty-six feet in length. The 
upper part is covered with porcelain tiles of a subdued blue.. 
The effect is considered by artists to be remarkably fine. 

The lower part of the building is covered with marble,, 
and passages from the Koran, written in interwoven charac- 
ters, run around the building like a frieze. 

Within, the building is not particularly remarkable, ex- 
cept for the great rock in the center, and the traditions 
which cluster around this rock, which, by hundreds of mil- 
lions of people, is regarded as the central point of the world. 

Just how large the claim on your reverence may be 
which this rock should have, it is difficult to tell, but, in any 
event, it will always hold its preeminence as one of the most 
sacred spots to Jew and Mohammedan and Christian alike. 

Authentic Jewish tradition tells us that on this very rock 

Abraham offered sacrifice. Here Isaac lay, bound and ready 

for the sacrificial knife which his father held in his hand 

when the arresting voice of God was heard. Some scholars 

say that on this spot the Holy of Holies of the ancient temple 

stood, while still others declare that the great sacrificial altar 
30 



496 A SATANIC LEGEND. 

stood here, and have discovered on the rock what they be- 
lieve to be traces of a channel for carrying off the blood. 

Many of the traditions which now cluster about this place 
are undoubtedly of Mohammedan origin, and are of little 
interest to Jew or Christian except as curious freaks of the 
imagination. 

But we will follow our old sheik about, as, with implicit 
faith in his own story, he tells the tale to us. The great 
rock which gives its name to the mosque is enclosed by a 
screen which was put up in the days of the Crusaders, but 
through the holes in the screen we can stick our fingers and 
touch the sacred stone itself. 

Just outside the screen, on the east side of the mosque, is 
a stone in which are some nail-holes, while two or three nails 
seem to be still driven into the stone and there remain 
imbedded. Here, our ancient " humbug " of a sheik pauses 
impressively and points with his fat fore-finger to these nails, 
" Do you see this stone ? " he says, while his Arabic is trans- 
lated into English by Abdallah. " There used to be thirteen 
nails in this stone, and the devil knows very well that when 
all the nails are drawn out the end of the world will come. 
Of course, he is anxious for this so that he may escape from 
torment himself. One day he came into the mosque with 
his ugly forked tail and dreadful hoofs and began to pull out 
the nails. He had pulled out ten of them and another was 
half out when Gabriel saw what he was about, and stopped 
him in the midst of his occupation. You can see that what 
I am telling you is true," added the old sheik, "for there 
are only two and one-half nails left, and you can see that 
the devil pulled out all the rest before he was stopped." 

This avaricious old sinner went on to say, "If anyone 
puts some backsheesh down on this stone he is sure of going 
to heaven." After this solemn assurance, we threw down a 



WHERE PATRIARCHS AND PROPHETS PRAYED. 497 

■copper, and turning to the old Moslem, asked him if that 
would assure us entrance into Paradise, but the sheik was 
too shrewd to commit himself. " You may possibly squeeze 
in," he said, " but if you would only give two francs, it 
would make it sure." However, we declined to purchase 
bliss at any such price as this. 

This whole huge rock is supposed by Mohammedans to 
rest on nothing, and when one goes down into a kind of 
crypt or cellar-way underneath the rock, and shows them the 
substantial stone pillars which support it, they claim that 
underneath the crypt it is entirely hollow, and prove it by 
pounding on the floor, which makes a hollow rumbling sound 
as though there were a cavern beneath our feet. 

In this subterranean chamber our dragoman points out 
the places where David, Solomon, Abraham, and Elijah were 
in the habit of praying. Here Mohammed used to pray 
also, and, being a tall man, when he rose from his knees he 
would surely have bumped his head against the ceiling, but 
very considerately the stone rose out of his way, and there 
is a hollow over our heads of exactly the shape of Moham- 
med's turban. 

In this rock is also a round hole through which, the 
faithful assure us, that Mohammed ascended into heaven. 
The stone could not bear to be deprived of his company, and 
so it was following after him when Gabriel put his hand on 
it and stopped it from going any further. Upon this, the 
obedient stone settled back into its place, and blessed the re- 
straining hand. 

Our credulity is somewhat strained by this legend, but 
when we expressed any doubt, our old guide settled the mat- 
ter once for all by showing us a whitish quartz fragment in 
the heart of the rock, which he declared to be the tongue of 
the stone with which it blessed the hand of Gabriel. 



498 THE WELL OF PARADISE. 

Moreover, lie showed us a depression in the stone itself, 
upon which Gabriel's hand rested when it prevented the rock 
from flying heavenward. What more could be said hi view 
of such incontrovertible evidence % 

Going outside of the mosque again, we followed our 
numerous guides to another building which is scarcely less 
sacred than the dome of the rock. This is the mosque of 
El Aksa, a long, rectangular building, much inferior to the 
octagonal mosque that covers the sacred rock, but yet, hav- 
ing its own relics of supreme interest to the Mohammedan. 

Here is the sacred well of Paradise. As we look down 
into its cavernous depths, we can see nothing but a great 
black hole in the floor. "We are assured, however, that this 
is none other than the way to Paradise itself, for on one 
occasion, a pilgrim who was here drawing water, lost his 
bucket, and going down to get it, he saw two angels at the 
bottom of the well, who told him that this was the way to 
Paradise, and who at the same time, gave him two leaves 
from the Tree of Life. These he stuck behind his ear, and 
then came up to the surface once more, to prove by these 
incontrovertible signs that what he said was true ; and from 
that day to this, that precious romancer has been believed. 
Evidently, it is not alwa} r s certain that truth lies at the bot- 
tom of the well. 

In another part of this same mosque are two pillars 
through which a tolerably stout man can barely squeeze 
himself. The story connected with these pillars is that any 
one who can crowd through between them is sure at last of 
crowding into Heaven. Alas for the fat man ! There is no 
more chance for him to enter Paradise through this gate 
than for a camel to crawl though the eye of a needle. 

However, neither the stout man nor the lean man nor 
the middle-sized man could be deterred on any consideration 



THE STABLES OF SOLOMON. 499 

from trying to crowd his way between the pillars, until at 
last, so scandalous became the crowding and pushing of 
those who tried to get into Paradise in this cheap and easy 
wa}^, that the Governor of Jerusalem was obliged to fill up 
the space with an iron frame which still remains between 
the pillars, so that now neither fat nor lean can enter 
Heaven by this door. 

In this mosque there is a very beautiful carved pulpit, 
some ancient copies of the Koran, which are well worth ex- 
amining if the custodian can be persuaded to let us have a 
glimpse of them, and there are also some hairs from Moham- 
med's beard, carefully preserved in green wooden boxes. 
These, I understand, are never visible to infidel eyes, and we 
must take it on trust that wrapped up in innumerable 
cloths and reposing in a large wooden box, is an actual hair 
from the very beard of the marvelous man who so deeply 
impressed the world by his fanaticism and strange person- 
ality. 

Underneath the mosque of El Aksa are the so-called 
" stables of Solomon," huge subterranean caverns supported 
by stone pillars in which one would think a thousand horses 
might easily find accommodation, but whether one of Solo- 
mon's gaily caparisoned steeds ever munched his hay and 
oats in these caverns is an open question. They were un- 
doubtedly, however, used by the Crusaders and Templars in 
the middle ages, and the rings to which they tied their 
horses are still found in the stone pillars. 

!Now let us go out into the open air once more. It is re- 
freshing to breath God's sweet zephyrs, and to stand in His 
sunlight once more, after the dismal, oppressing shadows of 
the Mohammedan mosque. As we look around we find 
that both of these mosques and the other buildings of the 
Haram stand on a broad plateau, much of which is given up 



500 THE PLACE OF THE LAST JUDGMENT. 

to coarse grass and coarser weeds, with here and there a 
pretty wild flower peeping out of its green bed. 

From the top of the wall we can get a magnificent view 
of the valley of Jehoshaphat and the Mount of Olives be- 
yond. The whole hillside, which slopes down to the deep 
ravine and then rises suddenly on the other side, is dotted 
with tombs, — Moslem tombs on the side next to the city, 
Jewish graves on the further side, for Jews and Moslems 
alike agree that here at the resurrection day the nations will 
assemble to be judged for the deeds done in the body. 

To them this is the most solemnly sacred place in the 
world, and the suggestion from the wall which surrounds- 
the temple area is surpassingly awful to their imagination. 
Projecting over the wall and built in horizontally is a pros- 
trate column. The Mohammedans say that from this column 
a thin wire rope, when Gabriel's trumpet blast proclaims the 
last judgment, will be stretched to the Mount of Olives. 
Christ will sit on the wall, they say, and Mohammed on the 
opposite mountain as the judges of all the nations of the earth 
who will be gathered in the valley beneath. All men must 
pass over the valley on this rope. The righteous will be 
miraculously kept from falling, and will fly across the rope 
like lightning, while the wicked will fall into the abyss 
below and there will writhe in torment forever. 

There are many more traditions, wonderful and startling 
and curious, which cluster around this temple area. 

Not far from this mosque, Avhich is so crowded with 
Moslem traditions, is a place which is still more interesting 
and far more pathetic in my eyes than the one where we 
have spent the morning ; as much more pathetic as is real 
grief than doubtful traditions and simulated sorrow. I refer 
to the wailing place of the Jews. To this sorrowful spot 
let us take our way through the dirty, crowded streets. 



JEWS AT THE WAILING PLACE. 



501 



It is Friday afternoon that we visit this most doleful place, 
and after winding in and out through narrow streets and 
lanes we find our way barred by a high wall composed 
in its lower courses of huge blocks of stone. This wall is 56- 
feet in height and 150 in length and consists of 24 layers of 
stone, several of the stones being from 12 to 16 feet in 
length. 

As we come into the narrow courtyard bounded by this 




WAILING PLACE OF THE JEWS. 



high wall we find it filled with Jews of all ages, and of all 
conditions of life. Men, women, and children ; well-dressed 
Jews and ragged Jews ; dirty Jews and clean Jews ; dudish 
Jews dressed in the latest Paris style, and old patriarchs in 
sheepskin jackets and baggy trousers; fresh young faces 
whose beauty is not wholly spoiled by the inevitable Roman 
beak which so often makes the Jew look like a bird of prey, 
and old weather-beaten Pharisees with love-locks curling 
about each ear, and dangling down under their round caps. 



502 THE SOLEMN LITANY. 

Sitting on the ground were several old rabbis, reading 
from well-thumbed books of the law the appropriate pas- 
sages of lamentation and woe, while others responded in 
grief -striken accents, "We sit in solitude and mourn." 

But the most pathetic sight to me was that of old 
women whose grief could not be restrained and was evi- 
dently as genuine as it was uncontrollable. Spreading out 
their withered hands on the rough stones of the wall, with 
tears running down their cheeks, they would passionately 
kiss the stones worn smooth by the lips of countless pilgrims, 
•and cry out in very bitterness of spirit as the} r thought 
of the glories which had forever departed and the shame 
and contumely which had come to their once great nation. 

Here is the litany that was chanted, and my readers can 
imagine the weird and sorrowful scene as the leader, with 
the great book of the law opened before him, wails out his 
agony, and the people, many of them with tears streaming 
down their faces, utter the responses. Here is this strange 
responsive service which every week for many generations 
has been heard by the stern gray walls that overlook the 
scene and seem forever to bar the progress and happiness of 
the Jewish nation. 

Leader. " For the palace that lies desolate," 

Response. " We sit in solitude and mourn." 

Leader. "For the palace that is destroyed," 

Response. " We sit in solitude and mourn." 

Leader. " For the walls that are overthrown," 

Response. " We sit in solitude and mourn." 

Leader. "For our great men who lie dead," 

Response. " We sit in solitude and mourn." 

Leader. "For the priests who have stumbled," 

Response. " We sit in solitude and mourn." 

Leader. "For our kings who have despised him," 

Response. " We sit in solitude and mourn." 



A MOKE JOYOUS STRAIN. .503 

At this point the service rises from this minor key for a 
moment. The tears of the wailing multitude are dried for a 
little while. They cease to beat the wall with their with- 
ered hands, as, for a moment, the joy of the coming kingdom 
in which they still hope Israel may have a share, breaks 
upon their vision; and, while their leader reads: "We pray 
thee have mercy on Zion," the response comes back, 
u Gather the children of Jerusalem." 

Leader. "Haste, haste, Redeemer of Zion." 

Response. " Speak to the heart of Jerusalem." 

Leader. "May beauty and majesty surround Zion." 

Response. "Ah, turn thyself, merciful to Jerusalem." 

Leader. "May the kingdom soon return to Zion." 

Response. " Comfort those who mourn over Jerusalem." 

Leader. " May peace and joy abide with Zion." 

Response. "And the branch of Jesse spring up at Jerusalem." 

As one listens to this sad wail, even though relieved at 
times by a more joyous strain, he cannot help believing that 
the Jews are not cast off forever, that a people of so much 
moral earnestness and intensity have a great future as well 
as a great history behind them, and that a nation that has 
resisted the encroachments of every enemy that could be 
marshaled against them and still retain in their integrity so 
many of their national characteristics, have a strength and 
tenacity of purpose which will be used by Providence in 
working out in the future His great design. 

Mean and squalid as is the wailing place of the Jews, one 
returns from a visit there not only impressed and saddened 
by the concentrated grief of a great people, but also im- 
pressed with the possibilities of such a people when regen- 
erated and redeemed by the Saviour whom now they reject, 
when they shall take their place among the united, progress- 
ive Christian nations of the world. 



CHAPTEE XXVII. 

IN THE HOME OF SAINT PAUL — THE FAMOUS CEDARS OF 
LEBANON — OUR EXPERIENCES IN THE LAND OF THE 
SULTAN — AT THE MERCY OF INHOSPITABLE TURKS. 

Embarking at Jaffa — Americans in Syria — Their Splendid College — An 
Interesting Room — The Beginning of Our Tribulations — A Turkish 
Custom House — Forbidden Words — The Sapient Censor — A School 
Boy's Composition and What Came of it — The Use of Ironclads 
— An Ul-Starred Rebellion — " No Mean City" — St. Paul's Well — 
Drawing Water from It — -St. Paul's Tree — St. Paul's Institute — 
Humble Streets — A Walk to the Vali's Palace — "Palace" or 
"Sheds"? — In the Presence of His Excellency — "The Bouyou- 
rouldou " — Official Handwriting — A Sunday in Adana — A Living 
Screen — A Congregation of Fezzes — Squatting on the Floor — " Is- 
America on a Hill ? " — Preparing for our Overland Journey. 




UR way from the Holy City to the 
land of the Sultan proper, led back 
once more to Jaffa, where we 
found the sea smiling and calm as 
though it had never thought of 



frightening poor pilgrims, or in- 
gulling their frail boats as it so 
often seems to do. Our embarka- 
tion was as quiet and peaceful' as 
EV'iP^d^^^^^^-^ f the landing was stormy, and the 

^fpff^^ -," , next morning after leaving Jaffa,. 

we found ourselves anchored in 
the roadstead of Beirut, the most enterprising and populous, 
seacoast city of Syria. 

While Beirut has many points of interest to the passing- 
traveler, that which impressed us most strongly was the work 

(504) 



TRANSLATING THE BIBLE INTO ARABIC. 505 

of the American Presbyterian Mission with its great printing 
presses, its churches, its school, and above all the magnificent 
American college which is the outgrowth of missionary work 
and influence, and which now boasts of buildings and equip- 
ment and faculty of which neither Yale nor Harvard nor 
Dartmouth nor Princeton need be ashamed. 

The Hospital of the Knights of St. John is here under the 
care of the medical faculty of the college, and is a most use- 
ful and worthy institution. This fine university only goes- 
to show that modern ideas of American Christian education 
are just as good for the Orient as for the Occident, that the 
same training and Christian nurture which develops well- 
rounded, symmetrical character in the American youth 
accomplishes the same for the young men of Syria ; for 
never have I seen a more manly or interesting body of stu- 
dents than assembled in the American College of Beirut. 
One of the most interesting historical sights to every Ameri- 
can Christian is that of a low and bare attic-room in one of 
the mission buildings where the translation of the Bible into 
Arabic was begun and completed by two American scholars. 
A marble tablet on the wall bears this inscription : 

In this Boom 

The Translation of the Bible 

Into the Arabic Language 

Was Begun in 1848, 

by Bev. Eli Smith, D.D., 

and prosecuted by him until his death in January, 1857. 

It was then taken up in October, 1857, by Bev. C. V. A. Vandyck, B.D., and 

completed by him August 23, I864. 

Away to the north, over a rough and difficult road, are 
the famous Cedars of Lebanon. 

They are in a valley which is dominated by the high 
peaks of the range, and stand on a little hill or knoll, so that 
they are visible from a considerable distance. 



50G THE FAMOUS CEDARS OF LEBANON. 

Though there are other cedar groves m Syria, the one 
here mentioned is the most important, for the reason that it 
is supposed to have furnished the timber for Solomon's Tem- 
ple, as recorded m the Old Testament. 

There is a great deal of romantic interest attached to these 
trees. One has heard of them from childhood, and has pic- 
tured to one's self trees of more than ordinary beauty, and 
of an exceptional fragrance. These ideas probably arise 
from knowing that Solomon considered no other wood 
worthy of being used in the adornment of the Temple, and 
that Tiglath-Pileser, having conquered Carchemish, came 
hither for the express purpose of carrying away a goodly 
number of these forest treasures to beautify his palaces. 

It is probable, that at a very distant date the slopes of 
Lebanon were clothed with forest ; but from time to time so 
many trees have been cut down by the Syrians themselves, 
as well as by their conquerors, that at the present day they 
exist only in small isolated groves. The most extensive of 
these, known to us as " The Cedars of Lebanon," is called by 
the Syrians " The Grove of the Lord," and in it there are 
three hundred and ninety-three trees ; of these, only twelve 
are of any great size, and they have received the name of 
" The Twelve Apostles," from a tradition that Christ once 
Tisited this spot with His apostles, who planted their staves, 
which grew into these goodly cedars. 

Kind friends made our two days in Beirut memorable, 
and crowded them with pleasant memories. Then we again 
took ship, and, after skirting the Mediterranean coast, touch- 
ing for a few hours at Tripoli, Latakia, and Alexandretta, we 
«3ame to anchor m the harbor of Mersin, and found ourselves, 
beyond all peradventure, in the land of the Sultan of Sultans, 
and within the very borders of the unspeakable Turk. 

To be sure, Syria is nominally ruled by the Sultan and 



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AT THE MERCY OF OFFICIOUS TURKS. 



509 



pays tribute to Turkey, and though this rule is severe enough 
in all conscience, and his oppression and tyranny sufficiently 
galling, yet no one knows the full extent to which outrageous 
tyranny can be carried, until he actually sets foot in Asia 
Minor, and finds himself in the Turk's own proper domain. 

Our tribulations began 
with the Custom House. 
Though we had three or 
four kind friends who ex- 
erted themselves to their 
utmost to see us safely 
through, their offices did 
not altogether avail. Our 
trunks were rummaged, 
our traveling bags were 
turned inside out, and 
everything in the nature 
of a book, even innocent 
Badseker and Murray, was 
confiscated by this pater- 
nal government which is 
so careful in regard to the 
reading matter of its sub- 
jects. And here, as first 
we land upon the inhos- 
pitable shores of Turkey, 
may, perhaps, be as good 

a time as any to tell my readers something of the tyranny 
which is only typified by the Sultan's custom house. 

It can be well imagined that the work of the Christian 
missionary comes in for the especial and particularly un- 
favorable notice of the Turkish government. An old treaty 
with the Christian powers prevents the Ottomans from. 




DRUSE FROM MOUNT LEBANON. 



510 OBSTACLES THROWN IN OUR WAY. 

crushing out Christianity entirely from their land, as they 
would be glad to do. This treaty guarantees liberty to 
worship God as the people choose, but in every way in which 
it can be made a dead letter it is annulled. Churches which 
are already established cannot be very well destroyed, but if 
a congregation wishes to build a new church or schoolhouse, 
or to put up any mission building of any kind, the most 
needless and exasperating obstacles are thrown in the way. 
One of the laws requires that permission shall be granted by 
the government authorities for any such new building, and 
some of our missionaries have been waiting for years and 
years for the permission, which they can never get, to erect 
their church or schoolhouse, even though the money is 
raised and the material on hand for the structure. 

The chief object in my journey across Asia Minor, as my 
readers know, was to speak in various large centers where I 
had been invited in behalf of the Society of Christian En- 
deavor, and to visit societies already established. But I 
found at once that obstacles and restrictions in the way of 
-Christian work had so multiplied of late that it would be 
very difficult to do what I had intended. I was told that I 
must not use in public address the words "organization," 
"society," "fellowship," "brotherhood," or anything which 
told of the union of young people for religious or other 
purposes ; that it was against the policy of the Turkish 
government to allow the people to unite or combine for any 
purpose whatsoever in any society or organization, and that 
everything was being done that was possible to break up 
all religious organizations. 

In every audience which I addressed, and I had the 
pleasure of speaking to many during my four weeks in 
Turkey, I was told that a Turkish spy was in the congrega- 
tion, and that any ill-considered word might land myself and 



TURKISH STUPIDITY AND IGNORANCE. 511 

half my audience in a Turkish jail. Everything in the way 
of printed matter which comes into Turkey has to pass under 
the close scrutiny of a stupid and ignorant censor of the 
press. So absurd are his objections, and so rigid is his 
inspection, that very little literature of any kind is allowed 
in these days. 

As illustrations of the stupidity which reigns in the 
censor's office many amusing stories are told. For instance, 
a Sunday-school lesson, which bore the Scriptural title 
"Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners," was 
amended by the censor so as to read, " Jesus Christ came 
into the world to save Christian sinners," since he wanted it 
plainly understood that the Kedeemer had nothing to do 
with Turkish sinners. A daily Bible reading, which was 
headed " Trouble in the Palace," referring to the palace 
which is spoken of in the Book of Esther, was forbidden 
because trouble and a palace (the Sultan's palace, of course) 
could not be spoken of in the same breath. Another Bible 
reading which bore the inoffensive title, " The People En- 
couraged," was likewise absolutely forbidden, with the sug- 
gestive comment that the government did not wish the people 
to be encouraged. 

Doubtless the truth was spoken in this comment if in no 
other, but this extreme rigor of the censor applies not only 
to religious books, but to school text-books as well, and here 
even more absurd and amusing stories of the censor's stupid 
caution are told. A book on chemistry, which of course 
contained the familiar formula, "H 2 0," was forbidden, 
because it was supposed to have some occult reference to the 
reigning sovereign, who is Hamid 2d, and it was interpreted 
to mean " Hamid 2d is nothing." A geographical text-book 
was forbidden because it referred to the junction or union of 
rivers, and the author was told that his Majesty desired the 



512 A DISCREET ARMENIAN. 

youth of his country to know nothing about union or com- 
bination. A chapter on star fishes was stricken out of a 
text-book of natural history, because some hidden reference 
to the Sultan's " Star palace " was suspected. 

But these emendations and objections of the censor might 
easily be dismissed with a laugh, as the vagaries of an 
ignorant man having in his hands for a brief time the reins 
of office, did they not show a studied and deliberate effort on 
the part of the officials to prevent all learning and advance- 
ment along the line of Christian civilization. The policy of 
the government is evidently oppressive and reactionary, and 
it means to do everything that it can to crush out the sparks 
of Christian education. 

When it comes to absolute torture, imprisonment, and 
death, this oppression is no longer a laughing matter, and to 
this point it has come to hundreds of the subjects of the 
Sultan. An intelligent and well-educated native Armenian 
Protestant pastor whom I visited had recently received a 
letter from Prof. Henr}^ Drummond of Glasgow, in which 
the writer spoke of his desire to visit " Armenia." The poor 
man who received the letter did not dare to keep it in his 
house with that compromising word on the title page, so he 
had carefully cut out the word " Armenia," and written over 
the place where it had formerly appeared the word " Turkey." 
Even the possession of that letter with that compromising* 
word might have meant for him years of imprisonment in a 
Turkish dungeon. 

Another man of whom I know was imprisoned for two 
years simply because the Turkish police found among his 
effects, when they were searching his house on one occasion, 
a school-boy composition which spoke of freedom and liberty, 
and expressed some natural sentiments for a larger and more 
untrammeled life than he was then leading. This composi- 



A COWARDLY TYRANT. 513 

tion, written fifteen years before his arrest, had been thrown 
one side and entirely forgotten until it was resurrected by 
the prying Turkish officials. But it was enough to compro- 
mise its author, and for two years he languished in a Turkish 
jail in consequence of that innocent boyish effusion. These 
are only a few incidents from many that might be cited to 
illustrate the outrageous tyranny of the weak and timid ruler 
who reigns on the banks of the Bosphorus. They are 
enough, however, to show the terror under which many of 
"the sick man's" subjects live, and they are enough to 
arouse the indignation of every freedom-loving American 
and Englishman on the face of the earth. 

Only by a combined protest of the Christian powers of 
the world, backed up by the necessary ironclads, can this un- 
happy state of things be changed ; but such a protest would 
be effective, and very quickly would the cringing tyrant, in 
whose name these outrages are perpetrated, issue different 
orders from those which now go forth from his palace, if he 
saw that the Christian pow T ers " meant business." The pre- 
text for these especially oppressive measures which have 
disgraced the government during the past year, is found in 
the so-called Armenian rebellion, an ill-timed, fruitless, and 
abortive uprising which was fomented largely by a society 
of Armenians whose motives were anything but patriotic. 

They represented, however, only a very small proportion 
of their countrymen, and the chief result of their ill-starred 
rebellion has been to make their fellow countrymen feel 
more severely than ever before the crushing heel of the 
tyrant of Constantinople. 

But we have not yet got beyond the custom house at 

Mersin, so long have Ave been in unburdening our souls of the 

righteous indignation that has taken possession of them. 

Mersin is an uninteresting seacoast town, where some fine 
ai 



514 IN THE HOME OF SAINT PAUL. 

missionary work is being accomplished by the Reformed 
Presbyterian Church of America among the Arabic-speaking 
Syrians. As soon as we could collect the belongings which 
the government allowed us to keep, we boarded the train on 
the little railway which runs between Mersin and Adana. 
"What is the name of this place which we hear the brakeman 
calling out with stentorian lungs? "Tarsus, Tarsus." Can 
it be that this is the famous city of Bible history, the birth- 
place of the greatest man who ever lived, the Apostle to the 
Gentiles? It certainly is no other. This was the city of 
the great tent-maker, who here wrought with his own hands, 
and who, with a touch of pardonable pride in after years, 
spoke of Tarsus, his birthplace, as " no mean city." 

The first thought that is apt to occur to the traveler in 
modern days is that whatever Tarsus may have been in the 
days of Saint Paul it is certainly a very mean city in some 
of its aspects to-day. Its streets are many of them narrow 
and exceedingly filthy. Few of its houses present any 
claim to architectural excellence. The roads leading to it 
are washed and almost impassable in many places, and yet 
in all these particulars it is not only no worse, but probably 
far better than the average Turkish city. Comparatively 
speaking, it can still be said that Tarsus is no mean city. 

Everything of chief interest in this ancient place clusters 
about the name of the great apostle. To be sure, the re- 
puted tomb of Sardanapalus is here, but it attracts only a 
momentary and languid interest compared with anything 
that relates to Saint Paul. These relics are few and meagre 
enough, and probably, in the whole collection, there is noth- 
ing that is absolutely and beyond question authentic. 

Here, however, is the so-called house of Saint Paul, 
which of course we visited. In the ample courtyard there is 
an ancient well which goes by the name of "Saint Paul's 



THE HOUSE AND WELL OF SAINT PAUL. 515 

Well," whose curbstone is worn deep in many places by the 
ropes which for countless generations have drawn the water 
from its liquid depths. We also drew a bucket of water 
and quenched our thirst and looked down into the silent 
depths which reflected the eye of the sun as it doubtless 
did when the boy Saul peered down into its depths, for these 
ancient wells are among the most authentic as they are the 
most indestructible evidences of antiquity. 

The house of Saint Paul, which occupies one side of this 
courtyard, is no doubt a comparatively modern structure, but 
it is quite possible that it stands upon the site of Saint Paul's 
own domicile. It was formerly the residence of the Ameri- 
can Yice-Consul at Tarsus, and we were very hospitably 
welcomed by his widow into their sitting-room, a comfort- 
able apartment surrounded on three sides by broad Turkish 
divans, but containing no very noticeable features or me- 
mentoes. 

In another part of the city is a fine Armenian church 
and school, near which stands a gnarled and rugged tree 
which tradition for many generations has called "Saint 
Paul's tree." For many years it has been withered and 
utterly dead, and it is not altogether impossible that it may 
have been growing eighteen hundred years ago, and that 
the boy Saul played under its shady branches. At any rate, 
its wood seems to be almost indestructible, for when, with 
the permission of the authorities which owned it, I tried to 
cut a sliver from its trunk as a memento, it almost turned 
the blade of my penknife, so compact was the iron fibre of 
the wood. 

But of all the institutions connected with the name of 
Saint Paul the one most interesting to me was Saint Paul's 
School, which was founded by the late Col. Elliott F. Shep- 
herd. On the very day of our arrival in Tarsus news of his 



516 DIRT AND FILTH EVERYWHERE. 

lamented death had been cabled across the sea, and teachers 
and scholars alike were in profound sorrow in consequence. 
However, their sorrow was mitigated when it was learned 
after a little that he had endowed the school with $100,000 
by his last will and testament. A fine, manly, courageous, 
set of boys were these who were gathered together to the 
number of nearly one hundred in this historic city, and 
according to their ability and opportunity, man} 7- will go out 
from this school in the future with the spirit of Saint Paul 
to do for their land what he did for all the world. 

From Tarsus to Aclana is twenty miles further by rail, and 
in this latter city we spent two or three memorable days, for 
they introduced us largely to missionary work in Turkey, 
and acquainted us with several brave hearts who are here 
quietly and unostentatiously working for the Master. Here, 
too, we got our first extended view of genuine Turkish life. 

Here Turkey is neither at its worst nor at its best. Pro- 
testant influence has leavened and elevated the tone of the 
city to some extent, but the many minarets from which five 
times a day at the hour of prayer the muezzin sounds his. 
call shows that the predominating influence is still most 
strongly Mohammedan. The horrible streets full of pitfalls 
and miry clay, the filthy alleys which serve as receptacles, 
for rubbish and swill, garbage and dead animals of various 
kinds, show that insufferable dirt is one concomitant of 
Turkish rule. 

One of our errands while in Adana took us to the Yali or 
governor of the province, for we desired of him passports 
and a safe conduct across the country to Constantinople. 
Let us take this walk and visit the Yali too-ether this morn- 
ing. As we turn out of the mission house, where we are 
making our home, we see at a glance that we are in the 
very heart of Turkey. Every person whom we meet, even 



THE UBIQUITOUS TURKISH FEZ. 



517 



the occasional foreigner, if he is of the male persuasion, 
wears the inevitable red Turkish fez, and most of them are 
clad in baggy trousers and long loose garments which reach 
below the knee. In one of the narrow streets though which 




OUR TURKISH PASSPORT. 



we pass we see the weaver of goat's hair plying his trade 
almost on the sidewalk. 

This was the very same material, doubtless, of which 
Paul made his tents, and perhaps he wove the cloth in the 
same way as this man who runs back and forth from one 
end to the other of his long loom, deftly twirling his bobbin 



518 IN THE STREETS OP A TURKISH CITY. 

and twisting the strands of goat's hair which afterwards will 
be made up into a rough and serviceable cloth. 

On the other side of the street from the goat's hair man- 
ufacturer is a mill in which sesame oil is being expressed. 
The sesame seed is run into a great hopper after being 
soaked for a sufficient time in the vats, and is then ground 
very fine beneath the revolving stones which are turned by 
a tread-mill ox, while the oil, thick and dirty, runs out into 
the vats beneath from a crevice in the mill-stone. This oil is 
very much prized by the natives, and is used largely in mak- 
ing a popular kind of sweetmeat, which one cannot fail to 
appreciate if he spends many days in Turkey, so toothsome 
and nourishing is it. 

And now in our walk, we come to the market-place of 
the town, a long covered street lined with little booths on 
either side, in which everything imaginable and many things 
unimaginable are sold. Hardware and crockery, dry goods 
and groceries, fish, flesh, and fowl, and good red herrings, 
too, for aught I know, are all sold in this busy bazaar. Here 
are money changers and shoemakers, fez manufacturers and 
kettle makers, all jostling one another side by side in their 
narrow booths. It is a scene of infinite life and variety, and 
would long delay our footsteps, if we were not hurrying on 
to see his Excellency, the Yali of Adana, to learn whether or 
not we may be allowed to make the journey on which we 
have set our hearts. 

Not far beyond the market place is the so-called " palace," 
but a sorry looking palace it is, indeed, for it strikes us that 
it might more properly be called the " sheds," since it consists 
of a long row of poor wooden structures around a large 
quadrangle. However, it is more picturesque and impress- 
ive to speak of the Yali's "palace" rather than the Tali's 
" sheds," so we will stick to the Turkish nomenclature. 



OUR INTERVIEW WITH THE VALI. 519 

Passing many Turkish guards and a large number of im- 
portant looking officials, who push aside for us numerous 
stiff hangings of heavy quilted stuffs which take the place of 
doors, we find ourselves soon in a large shabby room hung 
with faded red tapestry, and in the presence of the Vali him- 
self. He is a grave looking man of fifty years, or therea- 
bouts, with a good face which indicates that he is willing to 
do what he can for our comfort and convenience. First, he 
politely passed us a cigarette, which we as politely declined, 
and then, apologizing for not giving us coffee and other 
refreshments because it was Kamidan, he talked very pleas- 
antly for a little while of various matters, while our mission- 
ary guide interpreted his Turkish into our English. Then 
insisting that we should not go to Constantinople by way of 
Marsovan, which just then was the center of the Armenian 
disturbance, but that we should go by way of Angora which 
was more peaceful, he very readily gave us the necessary 
passports or tezkereis, and also a safe conduct, or " bouyou- 
rouldou." This document was written in huge Turkish 
characters, not straight across the page, but in a slanting, 
irregular, reckless kind of a fashion in which all official 
Turkish documents are written, for it is not at all cm fait to 
write such papers in ordinary epistolary style. 

Such bold and vigorous penmanship is supposed to strike 
terror to the hearts of all evil doers who may be confronted 
by it. It shows them that it is an official document, and, as 
we proved more than once during the long journey before 
us, there is nothing like a governor's bouyourouldou to insure 
a safe and happy transit across the fields of Turkey. 

One of the two days which we spent in Adana was Sun- 
day, and I had the pleasure of preaching to a very large and 
intelligent congregation gathered in the American Mission 
Church. The church itself is not an extremely large one, 



520 



PREACHING TO A TURKISH CONGREGATION. 



but as seats are done away with, and as the congregation 
squats on the floor as closely as men, women, and children 
can be wedged together, many hundreds of people can be 
gathered into a comparatively small area. Of course it is not 
proper for men and women to sit together promiscuously in 
the same part of the church. In many churches women are 




A SYRIAN WOMAN OF THE LONVER CLASS. 

relegated to the gallery, or are confined behind the lattice 
screen in the back part of the church through which they 
can peep at the preacher, but through which they cannot be 
seen by preacher or congregation. 

In Adana, however, the middle wall or partition between 
the men and women was made in a different way. The 
long row of benches ran through the center of the church 



AN AUDIENCE OP SQUATTERS. 



521 



from the pulpit to the door. On these benches sat a close 
line of men with their backs ungallantly turned toward the 
women, who occupied the space on the right hand side of the 
church, screened from the other men by the backs of the 
husbands and fathers who thus afford an effectual barrier 
between the two sexes. 

These high seats in the sanctuary are much coveted, I 
understand, by the older 
and more dignified men of 
the congregation, and no 
one is averse to doing duty 
as a living screen. All the 
men wore red fezzes while 
the chief speaker was dis- 
tinguished by a jaunty em- 
broidered blue cap which 
looked something like a 
smoking cap. This he re- 



moved during the services (j 
at which he officiated. 
"When I thought that every 
possible inch of squatting 
room was occupied on the 
women's side of the parti- 
tion, woman after woman would come in, stand on one foot 
for some little time in the smallest possible space, until her 
sisters before and behind and on either side pulled away their 
skirts, drew their knees a little closer together, and so made 
room for the late comer. 

At last the church was absolutely full, the service began, 
and a very helpful, reverent, and stimulating service it was 
so far as I could judge ; though I could not understand the 
hymns or the Scripture readings or the notices, and the ser- 




A SYRIAN WOMAN OF THE BETTER CLASS. 



522 



THE COLLECTION BOX IX TURKEY. 



mon, which I fear was the poorest part of the service, was 
laboriously translated from English into Turkish. I did 
understand the collection box, however, which is the same in 
all languages. 

It is very certain that such a congregation as this repre- 
sents the very best elements in a Turkish town. Not that 



y 






^a 












— 




OUR LIFE PRESERVER. 
(Facsimile of onr " Bouyourouldou.") 



the Armenians themselves are superior to the Turks as a 
race, in fact, it would be strange, if, after these centuries of 
oppression and tyranny their national characteristics should 
be very manly or strong. Those who live in Turkey say 
that the Turk, when found free from government influence 
and not under government employ, is the most honest, 
manly, and straightforward man in the empire. He makes 



REMARKABLE IGNORANCE AND AMUSING QUESTIONS. 523 

a faithful servant and a true friend, but he belongs to the 
present order of things. He is part of the machine which is 
used to crush the life out of this poor land and the manliness 
out of the subject races who inhabit it. The only hope 
which I see for Turkey is found in these mission churches 
and mission schools which are always connected with them. 
When the upheaval comes, as surely it will come one of these 
days, the educated Armenian Protestants will hold the key 
of the situation in their hands. Then will be seen the value 
of missionary influence and missionary work during these 
long decades, and that which has been sown in tears will be 
reaped in joy, and many a faithful missionary will sing the 
" Harvest Home," bearing himself the largest sheaf which 
it is possible for mortal to reap. 

The ignorance of the average Turk concerning places and 
people beyond him is most extraordinary and amusing. 
Many of them have very little idea that Turkey does not rule 
all the rest of the world, including America, and many of 
the Turks have only just begun to wonder if it is possible 
that all the people of the world are not Mohammedans. One 
of these conceited and ignorant natives said to a friend of 
mine a little while ago : " You are constantly talking 
about America. Now is this America on a hill or is it situ- 
ated . in a valley % " Another, when walking outside of a 
Turkish city, in a most flat, uninteresting suburb, which was 
chiefly noticeable for its rubbish and its dead cats, where my 
friend assured me he had to hold his nose in order to escape 
the stifling stench, was asked by a native friend by his side : 
" Did you ever see anything as beautiful as this in America?" 
It is difficult, indeed, to enlighten such dense ignorance. 

Two days in Adana sufficed to make all our preparations 
for the coming journey. In fact, the friend who had come 
from the interior to meet us with his faithful Turkish servant, 



524 PREPARING FOR OUR JOURNEY ACROSS TURKEY. 

bad already made most of these preparations before we bad 
come. The spring wagon, tbe pride of the touring mission- 
ary, bad come all tbe long journey across tbe mountains to 
carry us back witbin its capacious interior. Our passports 
and our safe conduct were all correctly vised. Our Turkisb 
guard, tbe soldier wbo was to protect us from all tbe robbers 
and dangers in the way, armed cap-ar-pie, w r as to meet us at 
Tarsus next day, whence we should set out for our long over- 
land trip, fraught as it was with unknown dangers and 
difficulties. 




CHAPTER XXVIII. 

A REMARKABLE JOURNEY ACROSS ASIA MINOR IN A SPRING 
WAGON — THRILLING EXPERIENCES BY THE WAY — A 
DANGEROUS RIDE. 

An Imposing Cavalcade — Foolish "Franks" — An Arsenal of Archaic 
Weapons — Ali, the Turk — Anastas, the Errand Boy — "Meat" — 
Entrancing Scenery — Snow-capped Lebanon — Eloquent Ruins — Our 
Fellow Travelers — Caravans of Camels — The Patient Donkey — 
Pleasant Salutations — "May the Almighty Cling to your Hand" — 
The Motto of the Spoons — The Story of the Dervish — The Holy Ass. 

— A Chip of the Old Block — Keeping Off the "Evil Eye" — "You 
Dirty Brat" — A Fond Mother's Salutation — The Mother-in-Law in 
Turkey — A Typical Turkish Khan — Sharing a Bed with the Camels 

— Through the Cilician Gates — The "Bad Five Miles" — How We 
Held the Wagon Crossing the Taurus Mountains — In the Guest Room 
of Selim. 




T was a bright spring morning 
when we set out from Tarsus for 
the long journey across the Tau- 
rus mountains and over the 
plains of Asa Minor for the 
beautiful city on the Golden 
Horn. We formed quite an im- 
posing cavalcade for these roads 
unaccustomed to wheeled ve- 
hicles. The camel drivers stared 
at our wagon, the donkey boys 
pricked up their ears as they saw 
us approaching, and gazed at us until we had disappeared in 
the dim distance, wondering, we suppose, why those 
" Franks " should be so foolish as to start across the country 
in wagons when they could so much more easily go by sea. 

( 525 ) " 



526 A NATIVE TRAVELING OUTFIT. 

In front of us pranced our Turkish soldier, or Zabtiyeh, 
who had made himself a perfect arsenal of obsolete weapons. 
Then came the two-horse wagon into which was packed not 
only our three selves and our missionary guide and driver, 
but four cot beds with appropriate bedding, pillows, blank- 
ets, and coverlets for the cool nights, and a huge basketful 
of provisions which our kind host had packed for us with 
the utmost care, and which was supposed to be enough, 
when supplemented by occasional draughts on native stores 
by the way, to last us to Caesarea, six days distant. 

Following this wagon came a disreputable-looking spring- 
less cart drawn by two specimens of Turkish horse flesh, 
and carrying two trunks and various provisions in the way 
of bedding and provender for men and beasts. The driver 
and owner of this cart was a native who wished to get to 
Caesarea and who was glad to earn a few chereks on the 
way. 

With him was our faithful servant Ali, a character in his 
way, shrewd, kindly, competent, and faithful to the last de- 
gree, a man who, I verily believe, would lay down his life 
for his master or for any one in the party if danger came in 
the way. Nominal Turk though he was, his allegiance to 
the false prophet evidently sat very lightly upon him, for he 
always appeared at prayers morning and night, and seemed 
to be among the most devout worshipers at the Protestant 
church services on the way. To avow himself a convert to 
Christianity would doubtless have compelled him either to 
forfeit his life or his country. His courage as yet was not 
quite equal to this supreme test, though I have no doubt that 
in heart he was a sincere Christian. 

Together with Ali and the driver was an assistant, a sort 
of general errand-boy, fire-builder, wood-carrier, and water- 
drawer, named Anastas. He had run away from home 



"meat, meat." 527 

some weeks previously, but was now heartily sick of his fool- 
ish adventure and was quite willing to work his passage 
back to Caesarea once more. The little pilgrim seemed to 
have a wonderful attraction for him. Anastas could 
scarcely keep his eyes or his hands off him. He would fol- 
low him about all day like a big, good-natured shepherd dog. 
He would run races with him and chase hamsters and en- 
gage in stone-flinging matches, and every now and then he 
would come up to him and taking his hand would say very 
impressively, " Meat, meat." For a long time we could not 
understand the significance of this word, until it was at last 
■explained to us that he thought this was the little pilgrim's 
name, as he had heard some one asking him to pass the meat 
at the dinner table. Jumping at this conclusion from such 
uncertain premises he was not able to get the idea out of his 
head during all the long journey, but in every way possible 
showed his interest and affection in his little friend " Meat." 
For a short distance from Tarsus we were escorted by 
two of the faithful teachers of Saint Paul's institute to 
which I have before alluded. Then they turned their horses, 
bade us adieu, and galloped back to Tarsus, leaving us alone 
with the long three-weeks journey before us. For a little 
way out of Tarsus the road is tolerably good as Turkish 
roads go, and in some places it is possible for horses which 
are fresh and ready for the journey to trot for a little way. 
JBut soon the hills begin and the roads become unutterably 
rough and rugged. The air, however, is clear and bracing, 
our spirits are good, and the view becomes at every step 
more entrancing. As we look back we see the fertile plain 
of Adana stretched before us, and beyond the snow-capped 
mountains of Lebanon, while before us, rising peak on peak, 
are the magnificent heights of the Taurus. There are few 
more magnificent mountain ranges in the world and few are 



528 A COUNTRY OF WONDERFUL INTEREST. 

less frequently visited in these clays than this mighty range 
which forms the backbone of Asia Minor. 

In ancient times, to be sure, it was different. The com- 
merce of a good part of the world poured through these 
rocky defiles, and the Cilician Gate through which we shall 
soon pass, was the highway for innumerable caravans of 
costly goods, for armies, and for travelers of all degrees and 
conditions in life. 

Across these mountains traveled the Apostle Paul more 
than once. This same way came Cicero and other Roman 
statesmen scarcely less distinguished, while the armies of 
emperors frequently defiled through these narrow gorges. 

We are not only in a country of surpassing natural beauty 
but one of wonderful historic interest. These craggy peaks 
and hilltops, if they could speak, would a tale unfold of wars 
and rumors of wars, of civilization advancing and retrograd- 
ing, of nations waxing and waning, of armies marching and 
countermarching, which could not be told by any other 
mountain peaks- in the world. In these silent fields and be- 
neath these occasional ruins are, doubtless, buried historical 
treasures of the rarest and most unique interest. But the 
oppressive government regulations make it impossible for 
any archaeologist to dig for hidden treasure, and, while the 
present regime lasts, the world will be none the wiser con- 
cerning these relics of the past. 

The fellow travelers whom we meet or pass on the road 
are all of one description ; no hacks or four-in-hand turn- 
outs do we see, no tally-ho coaches or gigs or buggies, no 
bicycles or tric} r cles, no phaetons or landaus, not even a 
baby carriage or anything else on wheels, do we meet, but 
long processions of knock-kneed, ragged camels, carrying, 
strapped to their patient backs, and dangling on either side, 
a heavy load of some five or six hundred pounds in weight, 



CARAVANS OF KNOCK-KNEED CAMELS. 



529 



which, for many weary days, they must bear as they go 
swaying and stumbling across the country from sea to sea. 

These camels are very rarely met with singly, but usu- 
ally in caravans of from ten to one hundred, loosely tied 
together by a string or small rope which can easily be 
broken, so that in case one of the camels wanders out of the 




A SHIP OP THE DESERT. 



line or falls over a precipice, the whole caravan may not go 

with him. 

Usually preceding the camels and leading the whole train 

by a chain attached to his bridle, is an absurdly diminutive 

donkey on whose back is often perched a very large Turk, 

whose huge feet (they all seem to wear number eighteen in 

this country) sway back and forth and dig viciously into the 

sides of the little beast with every step he takes. 

One is never tired of these strange processions of men and 
32 



530 TURKISH GREETINGS. 

variously assorted beasts. It always seems to us as if the 
huge camel would be ashamed of the long-eared little guide 
which leads the way, and as though the look of supercilious 
scorn which he always wears, was assumed to show his in- 
difference to the indignities that are heaped upon him. 

Our fellow travelers, however, we find are by no means 
destitute of politeness or cordiality. In fact, they could give 
many points to the boors of our crowded modern thorough- 
fares in the way of gentle courtesy on the road. Almost 
every camel driver and donkey boy whom we pass makes a 
kindly bow to us, and cries out as we get within earshot, 
" Oughourlar olsoun," which means when translated, " A 
pleasant journey to you." If Ave are sufficiently up in our 
Turkish to respond in a proper manner, we shall reply to 
him, " Sagh olsoun," whereby we mean to say, "Long life to 
you my friend." 

These greetings which one receives upon the way in 
Turkey, and in every house which he enters, at every table 
at which he sits, and on all possible occasions, are exceed- 
ingly pleasant and show an inbred courtesy which speaks 
well for the fundamental character of the race which has 
coined and adopted them as a part of its common verbal cur- 
rency. For instance, when we enter a Turkish house we are 
often greeted by this kindly phrase, "Khouda el inden 
yapusha," which, being interpreted, means, "May the 
Almighty cling to your hand," a most beautiful way of ex- 
pressing greeting and good will and continued blessing. 
The response very often is, " Akubetin Khair olsoun," which 
means, " May your end be good," or, in other words, as 
every Mohammedan interprets it in his own mind, " May 
you become a good Moslem before you die." When one 
rises from the table where he has partaken of all the good 
things which his host can offer, if he is versed in Turkish 



ORIENTAL POLITENESS. 



531 



politeness he will sa,y, " Bereket v T ersin," " Let it give a bless- 
ing." 

When we receive a present, however slight it may be, the 
recipient says, " Elenize dagh luk " which is not onr meagre, 
conventional " Thank you," but is a poetic expression mean- 
ing, " Health to your hands, my dear sir." 

For special and peculiar services there are special and pe- 
culiar expressions of appreciation and thanks, and not one 




NATIVE KHURDS OF ASIA MINOR. 



unvarying meaningless formula, as in Western languages. 
For instance, when a Turk receives a drink from a friend of 
anything but coffee, he remarks as he hands back the empty 
cup, " Afiyet olsoun," by which he means to say, " May it be 
for your health." "Why he does not make this same response 
when treated to coffee I have never yet been able to under- 
stand. 

Even the wooden spoons with which we dip into the com- 
mon bowl which always graces the center of the Turkish 
dinner table, are decorated with a motto of hospitality and 



532 A GOOD STORY. 

good cheer, such as, " Eat, my friend, eat," or " Pardon our 
poor fare and call it not entirely tasteless." Or, perhaps it 
may be, " Consider not the poor food which is set before 
you, but the spirit in which it is given." 

As we journey along, we frequently see by the roadside 
a scrubby tree, from every branch and twig of which flut- 
ters a rag. Some of the rags are bleached and weather- 
beaten, and have evidently been tied to the tree for man} r a 
long day, while others look as though they had been just 
attached. These trees mark the sacred spot where the grave 
of some holy man is supposed to be, and every pilgrim who 
passes that way ties a new rag to the tree to propitiate the 
saint buried beneath, and to insure for himself a speedier 
entrance into heaven. 

The old dervishes frequently make a very good living by 
establishing themselves near one of these trees, and asking* 
alms of all who pass by. 

A good story is told of a poor old dervish who lost all 
his worldly goods, and set out on a new pilgrimage with his 
family and his faithful donkey. For a time they lived in 
great poverty, but in the course of a few years a new-made 
grave under a spreading tree by which the dervish had en- 
camped, obtained a great reputation for sanctity. Many 
were the pilgrims who resorted hither. Many were the dis- 
eases that were healed, and the good fortunes that were told 
beside that holy grave. The tree became decorated with all 
sorts and sizes and colors of rags, for most of the pilgrims 
who pass that way are clad in an abundant supply of tat- 
tered and filthy garments. The old dervish became pros- 
perous and waxed fat, but after a while his son became un- 
easy and dissatisfied with the way he was living, so he 
started out for himself to make his own fortune in the world. 
Thinking there was no easier way than that which his father 



EMBLEMS OF GOOD LUCK. 533 

had pointed out, he established a holy place of his own not 
far off, and seated himself by another grave under another 
green tree. 

So popular did this new resort become that the old 
dervish's popularity began to wane, so he went to visit his 
son, and, when he found him, he asked him the cause of his 
sudden popularity. " "Well," said the youth who had bettered 
his father's instructions, " you tell me who is buried in your 
holy grave and I will tell you who is buried in mine." " My 
old donkey died," frankly confessed the father. " I mourned 
over her and buried her under the green tree. People came 
to worship at the new-made grave, and it was not my busi- 
ness to tell them who was buried there since they received 
so much benefit from their pilgrimage. And now tell me, 
my son, who occupies the grave over which you keep watch ? " 
" Ah," answered the chip of the old block, " I followed your 
example, and in my grave is buried the foal of your ass." 

This story, which is told with great gusto in different 
parts of Turkey just as the tales accredited to Abraham 
Lincoln are heard in all parts of America, illustrates the 
superstitious ignorance of the common people. In a hundred 
other ways are these superstitions manifest. Every camel 
and donkey that we meet has upon his neck a string of blue 
glass beads, which are supposed to keep off the " evil eye," 
and no camel driver would think for a moment of leaving 
home without decorating every animal in his caravan with 
these emblems of good luck. 

Yery often mothers are seen slapping their children in a 
most vicious way, and calling them "ugly brutes," and 
"dirty brats," and all kinds of opprobrious names. We 
soon find, however, that this shows no lack of maternal 
affection, but is simply the mother's way of warding off evil 
and blight from the child. She thinks that if the evil spirits 



534 



INDIGNITIES BORNE BY TURKISH WOMEN. 



hear her disparage her child and call him an " ugly brute," 
they will not think it worth while to trouble him, and so the 
evil eye will be averted. 

But, at the best, women and children in this land, as in 
all heathen and semi-heathen lands, have a hard time. The 

women are looked upon as 
beasts of burden. Doubt is of- 
ten expressed as to whether or 
not they really have souls, and 
even by the most enlightened 
Turk their souls are not sup- 
posed to be of the same dimen- 
sions as those of their husbands 
and brothers and sons. JSTo ac- 
count is taken of the girls by 
many men when they reckon 
up their families, and the mise- 
ries of a bride in a Turkish 
house are often unutterable. 
Abused and despised, beaten 
and forsaken, with no redress 
and no opportunity to tell her 
woes, she can only gain com- 
fort from the thought that some- 
time she will be a mother-in- 
law herself, and can take it 
out in abusing her daughter- 
in-law to her heart's content, just as freshmen, when they are 
harrowed and hazed, put under the pump, and initiated into 
the horrors of the secret society, comfort themselves with the 
thought that next year they will be sophomores, and there 
will be another class of freshmen for them to haze. 

It must not be thought that we make any remarkable 




A SYRIAN POULTRY SELLER. 



IN A TURKISH GRAVE-YARD. 535 

speed in this journey across the Taurus mountains. "We are 
not trying to solve the problem of rapid transit, and an 
. average of three miles an hour, and of from thirty to thirty- 
five miles a day we consider very good traveling. 

The first day out from Tarsus we stopped at a place 
which rejoiced in the euphonious name of " Grave Yard 
Spout," and, in spite of its name, it was one of the pleasantest 
places where we made our camp in all the journey. 

Let me introduce you to this typical Turkish khan at 
" Grave Yard Spout." We have not yet reached the old 
Cilician Gates, but have been climbing the slopes of the 
Taurus mountains all day long, and by nightfall are well up 
toward the line of everlasting snow. From these limitless, 
snow fields the brooks of sparkling water come dancing 
down. Their narrow channels down the steep mountain 
sides have something the appearance of eaves-troughs on a 
house, hence the " spout." On one side of the hill where we 
are to spend the night are a number of Turkish graves with 
rude, unhewn stones set up to mark the last resting place of 
the Moslem, hence the " grave-yard." A low, stone building 
on one side of the road, mostly buried out of sight on its 
lower side by huge piles of rubbish and manure, indicates 
the spot where we are to spend the night. Into the open 
doorway camels and donkeys, horses, drivers, and pilgrims 
all enter, for the Turk believes that what is good enough for 
his beast is good enough for him, and he never begrudges 
his own quarters to his patient camel or faithful ass. 

However, there is one room divided by a slight board 
partition from the rest of the khan, and into this the more 
fastidious pilgrims are allowed to go to spend the night. To 
be sure, it is a filthy place almost beyond description, and 
swarming with vermin. It has not been washed since the 
day the khan was built, and, perhaps, has not been swept out 



53G ROUGHING IT. 

for a year. But it is the best place which the region affords, 
and we will not grumble. Besides, have we not cot beds 
which can be set up out of the way of the dirt and largely 
out of the way of the fleas as well '( Have we not clean 
sheets and bedspreads, and a good supply of wholesome 
provisions of our own I Then what more can we ask, with 
fresh and invigorating mountain air to breathe, sparkling- 
cold water in which to bathe, and all out-doors in which to 
exercise ? Appetite lends a splendid sauce to every meal, 
and this bread and cheese, these eggs which Ali boils in the 
fireplace, and the pilaff which he concocts with rice and 
other ingredients, though mysterious, are most toothsome 
and nourishing. So we eat our evening meal, say our even- 
ing prayer of thanksgiving and petition for protection, and 
lie down to pleasanter dreams than any surfeited millionaire 
ever enjoyed. 

In the morning we are up betimes, sometimes long before 
daylight, for the success of the day's journey depends upon 
getting a good start. By the light of the gray dawn we 
drink our morning coffee, tie up our beds and bedding, pack 
the wagons, harness the horses, and are off just as the rising 
sun illuminates the frosty mountain peaks, and turns the 
descending rivulets into ropes of sparkling diamonds. 

About noon we stop for a hasty midday meal, and then 
press on again in order to reach the khan where we are to 
spend the night before sundown, where the same process of 
unpacking and setting up the beds, getting supper and eat- 
ing it, going to bed and getting up in the morning, repack- 
ing and starting on our journey, is repeated day after day 
until the journey ends. 

The second day out we came to the Cilician Gates, 
and here culminates the magnificent scenery which has 
been growing grander and grander with every passing mile. 



THROUGH THE CILICIAN GATES. 537 

Here is a narrow gorge between two towering precipitous 
cliffs which stretch up, up, up, for hundreds of feet above us 
on either side. There is absolutely no other way of crossing 
the mountain except at this point. Here, beyond a question, 
we are on historic ground. Paul must have come through 
this very gorge in the mountains. This old Roman road 
over which we are traveling was here in his time, probably a 
far better road than it is to-day ; this soil and these stones 
his feet must have pressed, and for the monarchs and am- 
bassadors, the conquered and conquering armies, the mer- 
chants and the diplomats of many centuries, this has been 
the highway. 

Just as we went through the Cilician Gates, where the 
pathway is most narrow and precipitous, for a rushing tor- 
rent disputes the roadway for passage, we met a long train 
of at least a hundred camels, floundering over the rugged 
road and through the muddy slough. It seemed as though 
our wagon could never make its way past these " ships of 
the desert," but we had learned by this time to have un- 
bounded faith in our missionary guide, and, sure enough, 
without accident or serious delay we forded the stream, 
wallowed through the mire, climbed the banks, brushed the 
flanks of the startled camels, and at length were through the 
historic mountain gorge, and had passed out of old Cilicia 
into Cappadocia. 

The third day out from Tarsus was the most exciting 
and dangerous part of the journey. For a little ways after 
we left the khan, where we spent the night, a good road en- 
abled us to get on at a brisk pace and cheered us with the 
illusive hope that our worst difficulties were over ; but alas ! 
this piece of good road was only the pleasant prelude to the 
very worst piece of roadway to be found in any one of the 
five continents which we are visiting. For five miles this 



538 AN EXCITING AND DANGEROUS RIDE. 

road is simply indescribable. No one who has made this 
journey could possibly believe that a wagon could ever be 
transported over it, or that horses or drivers could live to tell 
the tale on the other side of "the bad place," as it is signifi- 
cantly called by all in this region. 

In fact, there is no road at all. The government has not 
even pretended to make a road here as it has in some places. 
It does not degenerate into a squirrel track and run up a 
tree, simply because there is no tree for it to run up, for the 
country is as bare as the desert of Sahara. This bad five 
miles takes us over the very peak of the Taurus mountains, 
and the only animals which with any degree of safety can 
make this journey are the sure-footed camels and donkeys 
who monopolize the trade of this district. Even they some- 
times lose their footing and roll down the steep mountain- 
side into the abyss below, where we saw the carcass of more 
than one animal which had thus met its death. 

In the course of the centuries the unceasing caravans of 
camels have made a track along which, with careful steering 
and with abundant providential care, a wagon can sometimes 
make its way. We know this because we have seen a 
wagon go over this trail. On no account could we other- 
wise have believed it possible, but seeing is believing in the 
Taurus mountains as well as everywhere else. 

When we went down the hill on the other side of the 
"bad five miles," all the male members of the party hung on 
to the tail-board of the wagon to prevent it from tumbling 
end over end over the heads of the horses. Sometimes the 
rickety wagon would sway perilously on the verge of a 
rocky precipice. Often we would think that it was actually 
going over, and would catch our breath as we expected to 
see wagon, horses, and driver tumble into the terrible abyss. 
Then the driver would throw himself from side to side of the 






■■■ 







AN EXCITING MOMENT -OUR RIDE ACROSS TURKEY IN A WAGON. 

Sometimes the rickety wagon would sway perilously on the verge of a rocky precipice. 
Often we would think that it was actually going over, and would catch our breath as we 
expected to see wagon, horses, and driver tumble into the terrible abyss. Then the driver 
would throw himself from side to side of the wagon to keep it from toppling over, and the 
rest of us would throw our weight on that side to prevent the threatened catastrophe. 



ON THE VERGE OF DESTRUCTION. 541 

wagon to keep it from toppling over, and the rest of us 
would throw our weight on that side to prevent the threat- 
ened catastrophe. Thus we made our way down the peril- 
ous mountain side and drew a long breath when we found 
we were in the valley and realized that the worst of our 
journey was behind us. 

To be sure, it was only comparatively speaking that we 
could find any betterment in the road as we went farther on, 
for oftentimes, sometimes twenty times a day, we were 
obliged to get out of the wagon when the careful driver 
took it around some narrow, precipitous cavern, or drove 
over a heap of stones and boulders which had slid down 
from the mountain side, or forded a shallow stream which 
sometimes almost carried the horses off their feet. Forty 
times a day we would throw our weight on the up-hill side 
to prevent the wagon from going over the bank, or stand on 
the step for half a mile at a time to counterbalance in some 
degree the attractions of gravitation on the other side. 

But after passing this last spur of the Taurus mountains 
we never thought of complaining of any piece of road, 
nor do we ever expect to complain again, whatever highways 
fate may have in store for us. Toward dark of the fourth 
day out from Tarsus, Ave came to the little village Baila, 
and as the khan was full of other guests we sought for 
shelter in the guest-room of Selim, the elder and priest of the 
village. Let not the idea of a "guest-room," my readers, 
call up any luxurious notions of downy beds and costly car- 
pets and furniture, for though this guest-room was the best 
the village afforded, there is no New England cellar or 
Yankee coal bin which it was ever our fortune to inspect, 
that we should not have preferred to occupy. 

Fortunately the room is dark, and the narrow slits 
which serve as windows are covered with newspapers which 



542 A FILTHY AND HORRIBLE PLACE. 

are pasted over them, so that we cannot see the filthiness of 
the place in all its hideousness. We do not wish for more 
light, and after getting supper and setting up our beds we 
turn in, to sleep the sleep of the weary. 

This typical Turkish village where we have come to 
spend the night is like hundreds and thousands of others 
scattered all over the Empire. Perhaps there are two hun- 
dred people within its borders, crowded together in little 
huts of stone, which are but little higher than a tall man. 
The roofs are flat and covered with dirt, which does very 
well as a roofing in dry weather, but becomes very filthy 
and leaky when a wet season sets in. 

There are no streets in the village except such as are 
made by the pathways between the houses, and these path- 
ways are often full of pitfalls into which the unwary traveler 
will stumble if he is not careful. In these pits are stored in 
winter the hay on which the goats and cattle live during the 
cold weather. In the springtime they are mostly empty, for 
the store has been exhausted, and very frequently at the 
bottom of them I saw dead goats and sheep, which during 
the early spring had probably starved to death and which 
the unenterprising inhabitants had not even carried out of 
the roadway, but had left to rot and pollute the air, and 
breed pestilence and disease in their very streets. 

Could anything be more depressing than life in these 
wretched villages? Here are no books, no newspapers, no 
meetings, no intellectual life of any kind. Few of the 
houses show any light through their paper windows after 
darkness sets in. The inhabitants have nothing to do but 
to herd their goats all day and go to bed when darkness 
comes. No wonder that the people grow up ignorant and 
debased and absolutely devoid of ambition. The only 
wonder is that thev are not more vicious than they are, and 



AN IGNORANT AND DEBASED PEOPLE. 



543 



that after these centuries of intellectual torpidity and gov- 
ernmental oppression there is anything of manliness to 
appeal to in their natures. 

And yet, that there is a natural substratum of generosity 
and nobility in the Turkish character cannot be denied. It 
can be accounted for very largely, I think, by the good 




MUSSULMAN AT PRAYER. 



features of their religion, for, mixed with superstition and 
imposture as the faith of Mohammed is, there is something' 
in it of strength and virility. It demands unquestioning 
obedience and outspoken allegiance from all who profess to 
be governed by it. ]STo Mohammedan is ashamed of his 
faith. Our soldier guard, Avho ahvaj^s accompanies us, when 
the hour of prayer comes will dismount from his horse and 
prostrate himself towards Mecca, by the roadside, or will 



544 



DEVOUT MOHAMMEDANS. 



even go to the top of the house to pray when we are resting 
at noon, no matter how many pairs of curious eyes are upon 
him. Many and many a time have I seen a camel driver, 
poor, untutored man that he is, but confident of his faith in 
God and in the great prophet, kneeling in the grass by the 
wayside, while his tethered camels browse near by, offering 

his prayer to the great God, 
with no fear of ridicule to re- 
strain him from his oft-repeated 
devotion. 

As we lie down to rest in 
the guest chamber of the elder 
of Baila we hear the musical 
voice of the muezzin floating 
from the humble minaret near 
by, calling out to all the faith- 
ful, " God is great, God is great. 
There is one God and Moham- 
,med is his prophet. Come to 
prayer, come to prayer." 

As these sounds strike our 
drowsy ears we learn the secret 
of the vitality of the Turkish 
nation and the Mohammedan religion. There is truth 
enough in it to keep it sweet and from going to utter decay. 
There is truth enough within it to maintain in the nation 
the germs of a resolute, uncompromising manhood, and, as 
we drop off into the land of Nod, a new hope springs up 
in our hearts for Turkey and the Turks, as the cry of the 
dervish mingles with our dreams, "God is great, God is 
great. Come to prayer, come to prayer." 




t--^': 



THE CALL OP THE MUEZZIN. 



CHAPTEK XXIX. 

ON TO THE GOLDEN HORN — CONTINUATION OF OUR JOUR- 
NEY IN A WAGON — WHIRLING AND HOWLING DER- 
VISHES—VEILED WOMEN OF TURKEY. 

Watched by a Curious Crowd — A Broken-Hearted Wife — The Lamp- 
Dealer's Suspicious Balls — A Genuine Turkish Bath — The Feast of 
Ramidan — AVaking Up to Eat — The Difference Between a Black 
Thread and a White — Cross Officials — A Picked and Singed Turkey 

— Carving Up Turkey — Angora Cats and Angora Goats — Tying Up 
a Railway Train — Drawing Near to Constantinople — A Famous 
College — St. Sophia, the Marvelous — In the Hands of the Vandals 

— The Covered Face — The Bloody Hand of the Conqueror — The 
"Sweating Column" — The Whirling Dervishes — How They Whirl — 
Treading on the Babies — A Strange Ceremony — How the Sultan Goes 
to Mosque — Sanding the Road— A Mean-Faced Monarch — The Sultan's 
Wives and Daughters — A Timid Tyrant — Rich Stores of Costly 
Jewels — Beautiful Broussa — Tomb of Othman the Great. 




^OR thirteen clays our journey across 
Asia Minor was, with certain vari- 
ations, a repetition of the days I 
have already described. An early 
start, a long ride of ten or twelve 
hours, a hasty midday meal often 
eaten in the wagon, and, about 
night-fall, a new setting-up of our 
movable household gods in still 
another Turkish khan which 
always seemed a shade dirtier and 
a trifle more full of the concen- 
trated essence of unpleasant odors than the last one. 

There were, however, some noticeable breaks in our 
journey which must not be passed over in silence. On the 
fourth day, after passing over an immense plain, guarded on 

(545) 



546 WATCHED BY A CURIOUS CROWD. 

all sides by snow-capped mountains, we came to the ancient 
city of Tyana, which, in former centuries, was a most nota- 
ble place. Here a fine old Roman aqueduct brought deli- 
cious, sparkling water from the hills far away. Many of its 
arches are standing still, as fine in their ruined magnificence 
as the aqueducts about Rome itself. Under the shadow of 
these broken arches with their beautiful columns and carved 
capitals we ate our lunch, surrounded by a curious, open- 
eyed throng of modern Tyanites, who, to-day, very rarely 
see a stranger from the outside world, famous and much- 
visited as their city used to be in ancient days. 

Three hours beyond Tyana we came to Kigde, a thriving 
town of several thousand inhabitants. Here, many of the 
houses are of two stories, and have glass in their windows, 
and here it was our good fortune to rest during the Lord's 
Day in the house of the Protestant pastor of the town. 

Here, too, we had a new illustration of the awful tyranny 
under which the subject races of Turkey live. ISTo sooner 
had we gone into the house than a poor broken-hearted 
woman came to see the missionary who accompanied us, to 
tell him that her husband, t>he pastor of a native Protestant 
church, had suddenly disappeared while on his way to the 
village where his church was situated. No one knew any- 
thing about him from that sad day, though it was suspected 
that he had been arrested and imprisoned, and perhaps 
murdered for supposed complicity with the Armenian upris- 
ing. Of his innocence his poor wife was well assured, but 
for three months she had been waiting and hoping against 
hope, telling her little child that every footstep might be the 
long-lost father. But now she had almost given up in de- 
spair, and with streaming eyes came' to ask us if something 
could not be done to end her dreadful uncertainty as to 
whether her husband was alive or dead. 



SOME MYSTERIOUS LAMPS. 547 

To offset this pathetic incident of Nigcle, a rather amus- 
ing story was told us by one of the merchants of the place to 
the effect that one of his fellow shopkeepers had been a few 
weeks before arrested and imprisoned on some mysterious 
charge, whose nature neither he nor his neighbors could 
exactly determine. After a few weeks, however, he was 
released, and it was learned that his arrest was caused by 
some very innocent lamps which, in the line of business, he 
had imported into JSTigde. These lamps had been meant to 
hang from the ceiling, and, in order that they might be raised 
and lowered, a metal ball about the size of a small cannon 
ball came with them. These balls were considered suspicious 
by the Turkish authorities. It was thought they might be 
some terrible dynamite explosives destined to blow the whole 
country into atoms ; so the poor lamp-dealer was arrested and 
imprisoned without trial until the case should be investigated 
and his suspicious balls could be declared harmless. 

In the middle of our long journey, came a most delight- 
ful break, for at the end of our seventh day from Tarsus, 
after having traveled some two hundred miles, we came to 
the large Cappadocian city of Csesarea, which is a great cen- 
ter not only of trade but of missionary operations, and where 
the good friends who had sent one of their number for us, 
w T ith their famous spring wagon, had their abode. This, too, 
was an important town in Roman days and was named for 
Caesar Augustus. Ever since it has retained its pre-eminence 
in all the vicinity as a commercial center. 

The country about, though bare of trees, is fertile and 
capable of sustaining a large population. Our interest in 
Cassarea was not dependent upon beautiful scenery or the fer- 
tility of the soil, but centered in the charming American 
homes which are here established so far from their native 
land and from all that most of us hold dear. Here, for more 

33 



548 A DEVOTED MISSIONARY. 

than forty years, has one of the missionaries of the American 
Board been laboring through good report and evil report. 
Often at the risk of his life, and always amid perils and 
hardships of which the average American knows very little, 
he has kept on his way, winning by force of a gentle, digni- 
fied, and devoted Christian life the hearts of hundreds of 
people who are opposed to his creed, and who regard other 
Christians as infidel dogs to be kicked out of their country 
whenever opportunity affords. 

This veteran missionary has been joined in later years by 
his son-in-law and family, and by one or two other mission- 
ary families, among them a most devoted and skillful doctor, 
who would make his fame and fortune in scny country where 
he might choose to practice. Giving up the allurements of 
professional success and large income in his own land, he 
has come to this remote city where he can cure the bodies of 
the Turks and heal their souls as he finds his way to their 
affections and confidence. 

"While we are here together we will look in upon a 
genuine Turkish bath in the very center of Turkey. Many 
of my readers have been in the elegant establishments which 
abound in all our large cities, with their tiles and marbles, 
vaulted ceilings and fountains, plunges, hot rooms and cool- 
ing couches, but none of them, perhaps, have ever taken a 
Turkish bath in the land of its nativity. TVe will go to- 
gether this evening to this bath in Talas, a suburb of 
Caesarea. It has been built by one of the few enterprising 
inhabitants, who, as a young man left his early home, be- 
came famous in government circles, made his fortune in 
Constantinople, and instead of building a library in his 
native town as he would have done in America, showed his 
filial affection by establishing this Turkish bath. 

Into a narrow ante-room we go to leave our clothes, but 



A GENUINE TUKKISH BATH. 549 

instead of locking up our valuables in a fire-proof safe, as 
we are accustomed to do at home, we roll our watches, 
pocket-books, and other articles of value in our clothes, and 
leave this bundle on the divan of the dressing-room. Surely 
this speaks well for the honesty of Turkish human nature. 
Then we put on some high wooden clogs, in which we find it 
very difficult to shuffle about, and follow our attendant into 
the hot room. It is not very hot, but by staying there long 
enough we get into a gentle perspiration. In the middle of 
the room is a round stone dais under which the fire is built. 
Around all sides of the room are faucets of hot and cold 
water which we can turn on at our pleasure, and on one side 
of the large central room is a smaller apartment into which 
steam has been turned and where we can obtain a vapor 
bath if so disposed. 

For a little while I was alone with my friend in this 
great, round, tomb-like building, with the vaulted dome 
overhead which caught up and sent back and re-echoed our 
words, as though it was peopled with a hundred mocking 
spirits. But we were not long alone, for, one after another, 
the natives came trooping in until under that resounding 
roof there must have been at least fifty hot, sweating, vil- 
lainous-looking Turks. Moreover, they were in high spirits, 
for it being the time of Eamidan their day of fasting was 
over, and nightfall had brought the hour of feasting. They 
had evidently come from a good supper and were full of 
hilarity and glee. Laughing and talking and yelling at one 
another in their good spirits, while the echoing roof quad- 
rupled their noise, it seemed as though we were in pande- 
monium itself. However, it was a very good-natured pande- 
monium, and we very soon got used to the din. Then the 
shampooer came in and rubbed us down and kneaded us 
and punched us and thumped us like so much dough, work- 



550 CURIOUS CUSTOMS. 

ing every muscle, pulling out ever)'- finger-joint, and then 
sousing us with soap and hot water until all the cuticle 
seemed in danger of coming off. Then the process was re- 
newed, and after a little breathing spell was again repeated. 
Then we were rubbed with coarse gloves, soaped and washed 
and sprayed once more, and the process was declared to be 
complete. 

On the whole, it was very enjoyable, though I would 
prefer hereafter to take my Turkish baths in America rather 
than in Turkey. 

I have said we were in Caesarea during the feast of Bam- 
idan. A very notable occasion is this, corresponding some- 
what to the lenten season of the Catholic church. It begins 
with the new moon of March or April and lasts for forty 
days. If it is cloudy the authorities, curiously enough, 
apply to the heretical missionaries, whose religion they hate, 
but whose astronomical science alone tells them when the 
new moon has come. 

All day long for forty days the strict Moslem religiously 
fasts. From early dawn until sunset not a mouthful passes 
his lips, not a sup moistens his parched throat, not even a 
whiff from the inevitable cigarette is allowed. But at sunset 
a great gun is fired, the muezzin proclaims from the minaret 
that the sunset hour for prayer has come. But he does not 
linger long about his call this time, for he is as hungry as 
any of his devotees, and hastening down from his watch- 
tower, with all the other good Mohammedans, he hurries to 
the dinner table to make up for his long day of fasting. 

This is not the only feast of the night by any means. If 
the religious Moslem fasts all day he makes up for it at 
night, for at eleven o'clock, after a few hours of sleep lias 
been enjoyed, a great beating of pans and blaring of tin 
horns is heard and all the faithful wake up to eat once more. 



FASTING AND FEASTING. 551 

Then a little more sleep, and at three o'clock in the morning 
another gun is fired to waken the followers of the prophet to 
another feast. 

But when the first streak of morning gray appears, when 
the time comes that they can detect " the difference between 
a black and white thread," as the law requires, then the 
fast begins again and not another mouthful must they eat 
xmtil the sunset gun is fired. Those who can afford the 
time and do not need to work, sleep away as much of the 
day of fasting as they can and only wake up in season for 
the evening feast. "We found, to our cost, that our whole 
stay in Turkey coincided with the fast of Ramidan, for the 
officials were either asleep when we called on them for any 
favor, or so surly from their long fasting that it was with 
difficulty we could get what we wanted. But our precious 
■" bouyourouldou " which the governor of Adana had given 
us, usually overcame even the crustiness of the half-starved 
magnates, and we suffered but little detention or trouble in 
our journey. 

After leaving our good friends in Cassarea our route lay 
along the northern edge of Cappadocia, then into Galatia, 
where were the churches to which Paul wrote his eloquent 
epistle, then into Bythinia, which borders on the Black sea 
and the Bosphorus. Nowhere did we find a road so rough 
as the " five bad miles," but it was always sufficiently out of 
repair to remind us that we were still in Turkey. Though 
the government levies taxes of thousands of pounds every 
year upon the oppressed peasantry for the repair and main- 
tenance of this road, yet year after year no piastre is ex- 
pended and no shovel is lifted to make the road better. 
Much of the way over which we journeyed lay across an 
elevated table land where the scenery was monotonous and 
uninteresting, and the khans where we spent the night were 



552 CARVING UP TURKEY. 

very much like those with which we had previously become 
acquainted in Cilicia and Cappadocia. 

For days and days on this journey we saw no trees or 
bushes, and scarcely a shrub as big as a lead pencil. This 
Turkey has evidently not only been picked and singed, but 
even the pin feathers have been plucked out of the poor car- 
cass. It is evident that when the poor bird is roasted in the 
next war, it will be in order for the European nations to 
carve it among themselves. The only thing which prevents 
them from doing this to-day is, that each fears the other 
and that each wants the best cuts and largest slices of white 
meat and the tender second joints for itself. England will 
not let Russia have all the breast and all the dressing, Russia 
is bound to keep England away from this platter which it 
regards as altogether its own, while German}?- and France 
each think that they have something to say in the matter. 

In the meantime, the old bird is not yet carved up among 
the nations, and, as a consequence, the people of Turkey 
remain in ignorance and superstition, Christians are perse- 
cuted, progress is delaj^ed, inventiveness and enterprises are 
checked, and everything is going backward in the land of the 
Sultan, while all the rest of the world is moving forward 
with the lightning rapidity of the nineteenth century. 

" The United States has citizens, England has subjects^ 
Turkey has abjects," is a true and witty saying which every 
one fully appreciates after crossing Asia Minor. 

Six days after leaving Cassarea we came to Angora, a 
famous city both in ancient and modern times. Here we 
saw many cartloads of political prisoners who had just been 
released, going back to their homes again. Hundreds of 
these men had been arrested merely on suspicion, had been 
hurried away from their homes, manacled and chained, to 
prisons many days distant from their own villages ; and now, 



ANGORA AND ITS FAMOUS CATS. 553 

without trial or hearing, but apparently at the caprice of the 
Sultan and the reigning powers they had been released, 
probably because His Majesty fearing to kill them lest he 
should get into trouble with foreign nations, and not know- 
ing what else to do with them, had sent them home again. 

A few of their fellows, however, had been retained in 
prisons, and, at their subsequent trial which took place at 
Angora, seventeen were sentenced to death ; but when the 
Christian powers remonstrated and suggested that an iron- 
clad might make the remonstrance effectual, the Sultan 
yielded the point and pardoned most of his prisoners. 

Angora is noted not only for its beautiful fluffy -haired 
cats, which are famous all the world over, but also as the 
seat of the mohair trade. The handsome goats which furnish 
the hair clot the plains on every side, tens of thousands of 
them, with their long, crinkly wool hanging to the very 
ground. Beautiful, gentle-faced little creatures they are, as 
different from the ordinary vicious goat as a week-old lamb 
is different from his ugly progenitor. 

A new railroad has just been completed from Angora to 
Constantinople. It carries us at the rate of eight or ten 
miles an hour. Its trains do not run at night, but when 
darkness comes on they tie up wherever they happen to be, 
and start on again early the next morning. After two days 
of such journeying, during which we make but a little over 
two hundred miles, we reach at last beautiful Constantinople, 
the city which has the most superb situation in the world. 

As we draw near to this marvelous city, especially after 
spending many days in the barren interior, and amid the 
rugged mountains of Cappadocia ; as we see the smiling val- 
leys and well-clothed hilltops that surround it ; as we catch 
a glimpse of the Golden Horn and the silver waves of the 
sparkling Bosphorus, we acknowledge that Byron is quite 



554 AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS IN CONSTANTINOPLE. 

right when he describes Constantinople and its environs as, 

" The land of the cedar and vine, 

Where the flowers ever bloom and the beams ever shine, 

Where the light wings of zephyr oppressed with perfume, 

Wax faint in the gardens of Gul in her bloom, 

Where the citron and olive are, fairest of fruit, 

And the voice of the nightingale never is mute, 

Where the tints of the earth and the hue of the sky, 

In color though varied, in beauty may vie, 

And the purple of ocean is deepest in dye." 

It would take many a chapter adequately to describe the 
beauties and wonders of this imperial city, its magnificent 
situation, its unsurpassed mosques. Among them the famous 
Saint Sophia, with its curious and unending labyrinthine 
bazaars filled with rugs and silks, silverware and bric-a-brac, 
and everything that can tempt the cupidity and unloose the 
purse strings of the average traveler. 

Americans, too, may well have a particular interest in 
Constantinople, for here they have made their mark through 
their missionaries. The most important educational institu- 
tions and almost all the Christian work of the city is in the 
hands of American educators and missionaries. Here is sit- 
uated the famous Robert College which gathers its students 
from half a dozen nations, sets its seal of educated manhood 
upon them, and sends them out to be leaders and pioneers of 
civilization in their own lands. The most strategic position 
of any educational institution in the world, is that which is 
occupied by Robert College. 

Across the Bosphorus, on the Asiatic side in the suburb 
of Scutari, is the American College for girls, a school which 
I believe in the future will do for the young women of 
Turkey, Bulgaria, Roumelia, and Armenia what Robert Col- 
lege has done and is doing for their brothers. 

Here in Constantinople, too, is the famous Bible House, 



EDUCATING THE TURKS. 



555 



with its immense printing establishment, from which go 
forth every year so many printed leaves for the healing of 
the nations. So careful and wise are the directors of this es- 
tablishment that even the critical censor of the government 
cannot object to much of their work. To be sure they are 
hampered and hindered. Every obstacle is thrown in their 
way, and many of the 
publications which 
they would be glad to 
issue are altogether 
prohibited ; but in spite 
of these obstacles a 
vast amount of Chris- 
tian literature gets into 
the hands of the sub- 
ject nations of Turkey 
from year to year 
through this channel. 

"YVe must not fail 
to visit the mosque of 
St. Sophia, one of the 
most impressive 
churches in any land. 
As my readers doubt- 
less know, it was a 
Christian church in the time of Constantine and for many 
centuries afterwards. When Constantinople fell into the 
hands of the Turks St. Sophia became a. Turkish mosque; 
all the images of the saints were broken, every piece of 
carved stone work which bore any likeness to any creature 
in the air above or the earth beneath or the waters under 
the earth was chipped away ; the sign of the cross which ap- 
peared innumerable times in different parts of the cathedral 




3fc 











MOSQUE OF EL AZAR. 



556 



THE GREAT MOSQUE OF ST. SOPHIA. 



was everywhere chiseled out, and all the magnificent win- 
dows and mosaics were either broken or covered up with 
hideous yellow paint or plaster. Yet in spite of all this 
vandalism of fanatical image-haters, St. Sophia retains its 
ancient glory and impressiveness to a large degree. Its 
proportions are magnificently symmetrical. The dome, 

which hangs like a 
huge substantial bub- 
ble in the air, it is im- 
possible to describe 
with any adjective 
which the dictionary 
furnishes. 

The floor is now 
covered with prayer 
rugs, all of them point- 
ing toward Mecca, so 
that the devout Mos- 
lem when he pros- 
trates himself on his 
rug knows which way 
to face, as he mumbles 
his monotonous peti- 
tion. 

Not only for its 
present magnificence, however, is St. Sophia interesting, 
but because of its historic associations. Over this famous 
church, for many a century, has Moslem and Christian 
quarreled, and it bears within itself many a mark of the 
hands of its successive conquerors. High up on the wall, 
at least ten feet higher than a man on horseback can 
reach, the print of a bloody hand is pointed out, and we 
are told by our guide that that is the mark which was made 




SIDEWALK MERCHANTS, CONSTANTINOPLE. 



THE STAIN OF A BL06DY HAND. 



557 



by the conquering Sultan, who finally wrested Constanti- 
nople from the grasp of the Christians. As the last mark of 
his triumph he rode into this magnificent Christian church 
on horseback, after having slain hundreds of worshipers who 
were there assembled, and so high were the bodies of the 
victims piled one upon another, that when he reached up 
and struck his bloody palm against the wall it made the 
mark which now we see far above our heads. 




ST. SOPHIA, THE MARVELOUS. 



On the other side is a stone column which we are assured 
was cleft at the same time by the sword of this conquering 
monarch. Here the one who has faith enough may see the 
curbstone of the well of Samaria on which Christ sat. Here 
is a " sweating column," which is almost worn away by the 
fingers of the credulous, who find in the moisture which 
the stone exudes an ointment for all kinds of diseases. 
Some poor sufferers are always fingering this stone. 



558 THE FAMOUS "WHIRLING DERVISHES. 

But most impressive of all in this great church to the 
Christian, is a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ in mosaic on 
one of the walls, which has been smeared over and covered 
up by Turkish paint, but which in the slow process of the 
centuries is beginning to show through the veil with, which 
the enemies of Christ sought to cover his face. The outline 
is now distinctly visible and growing more and more dis- 
tinct, we are told, as time wears away the paint and the 
years roll on. ISTo Christian heart can look upon it without 
seeing in that picture a prophecy of the day when light from 
the face of Christ shall shine through the ignorance and 
superstition of the Moslem's faith, by which his perfect 
countenance has been obscured for so many centuries. 

Another famous sight which we shall be sure to see 
before leaving Constantinople is the whirling and the howl- 
ing dervishes. The whirlers whirl and the howlers howl 
every week, though in different mosques, and it is a sight 
which once seen is not easily forgotten. On the day that 
we went to see the whirlers we had to wait a long while 
before the first of the dervishes appeared. The mosque in 
which they perform their curious gyrations is a small build- 
ing with a circular space railed off in the center of the floor. 
Outside of the fence which incloses this circle, and in the 
gallerv above which commands a fine view of it, there are 
always crowds of spectators. 

When we had been waiting some half hour or more, two 
dervishes in tall, cream-colored felt hats like sugar loaves 
with the top cut off, entered the mosque solemnly and 
slowly. They were covered with long, dark cloaks and 
were very solemn and sedate, and, on the whole, good-look- 
ing men. Then a few more dervishes entered the mosque, 
and then more, until there were in all twenty-seven men in 
dark cloaks and tall sugar-loaf hats. Then three high der- 



BEFORE THE WHIRL. 



559 



vishes, one of whom wore a broad green veil around his 

sugar-loaf fez, showing that he is a direct descendant of the 

Prophet himself, entered the charmed circle. They seated 

themselves on the floor while all the others stood about the 

sides like carved statues. Then the statues unlimbered 

and began to march around, two by two, each member of 

each couple bowing low 

to the other as they 

came in front of the 

high dervishes. Then 

they bowed once more 

before the descendant 

of the patriarch and his 

companions, and march 

again around the circle. 

This process is re- 
peated three times, and 
each time a very low 
salaam is made by the 
man in front to the der- 
vish immediately be- 
hind him, and by the 
dervish behind to the 
one who marches imme- 
diately in front of him. 
Then to the discordant and creaky music of some pipers in 
the gallery they begin to whirl, slowly at first, but as the 
music increases in rapidity they whirl more swiftly and more 
swiftly still, until in a perfect frenzy they swing around their 
narrow circle. 

Before beginning this operation they cast off their long 
cloaks and appeared clad in skirts which reached consider- 
ably below their knees. As they whirled the skirts of the 




A WHIRLING DERVISH. 



500 A STRANGE CEREMONY. 

most energetic stood out stiff from their bodies like encom- 
passing balloons, just as I have seen the skirts of little girls 
fly out when whirling about in the process familiarly known 
as "making a cheese." Some of the dervishes whirl much 
better than others, and it seems to be the height of their am- 
bition to revolve so rapidly and smoothly that not one of 
them shall touch the other, and that their skirts shall stand 
out from their bodies as though distended by a huge crino- 
line. How they keep it up is a mystery, but keep it up 
they do minute after minute for fully ten minutes at a time. 
Then after resting a little they march round once more and 
whirl again, and this strange religious ceremony is over. 

At least this was all we saw the dervishes perform, 
though frequently babies are brought in in the arms of their 
infatuated parents and laid upon the floor of the mosque for 
the holy men to walk over. They step lightly and gingerly 
as though treading on eggs, and it is said that they rarely 
hurt the little victims under their feet ; still, it cannot be en- 
tirely pleasant for the babies. 

The "howlers" are very much of the same order, but 
instead of whirling they sway their bodies violently back- 
ward and forward and from right to left as though they 
would jerk their heads off their bodies, at the same time 
chanting a weird cry, which degenerates at times into a 
frightful yell. Their exertions are more violent than that of 
the whirlers and their healing efficacy in treading upon in- 
fants is said to be even greater than that of their brother 
dervishes. 

One more scene which we shall witness before leaving 
Constantinople is the weekly ceremony, which when trans- 
lated into English means the going to mosque of the Sultan. 
Every visitor who is in the city on Friday makes it a point 
of getting a permit from his consulate which will enable him 



HOW THE SULTAN GOES TO CHURCH. 561 

to see this wonderful sight. The ceremony of going to 
church is nowhere else attended by so much pomp and mag- 
nificence, or with so much fuss and feathers as that of the 
ruler of the faithful here in Constantinople. 

For hours beforehand the soldiers begin to assemble- 
From all parts of the city they come, infantry, cavalry, and 
artillery, bands of music, and flaunting horse tails, which in 
former years were the ensigns which led the Turks to 
victory. Every street and approach within half a mile of 
the mosque is lined with soldiers four deep, and even on 
ordinary occasions it is said that ten thousand men guard 
the sacred person of His Majesty every Friday. 

Half an hour before the Sultan's carriage appears upon 
the scene a half score or more of carts filled with sand of 
the finest quality sprinkle the roadway over which the royal 
wheels will trundle. Every little pebble larger than a pea 
is picked out by careful attendants. "We only wish, as we 
see all this preparation, that the Sultan could have gone over 
some of the horrible roads in the interior of his dominion, 
and have his royal bones shaken up as ours were shaken on 
his wretched highways. There would be some poetic justice 
in this. 

"While we are waiting for the royal carriage all is bustle 
and activity, scores and scores of elegant equipages drawn 
by prancing horses draw up in front of the mosque, and out 
of these carriages step most gorgeous human butterflies in 
bewilderingly magnificent raiment. Generals and commo- 
dores and ambassadors of the highest rank are here blazing 
with their decorations and jeweled insignia of office. Here 
come three or four beautiful carriages in which are the 
Sultan's wives and some of his daughters. They are not 
allowed to step out of the carriages, and we can just see their 
Mack eyes gleaming above their veils as they look out curi- 



562 



THE SULTANS WIVES AND DAUGHTERS. 



ously upon the scene, for this is one of the few outings 
which they have in their lives. Then comes the Sultan's 
nephews, the heir apparent to the throne, and his younger 
brothers and cousins, the smaller ones attended by ugly 
black eunuchs whose long arms seem to hang down nearly 
to their knees. 




A TURKISH BEAUTY. 



Into the mosque are now taken the Sultan's library 
chair, a box containing his clothes, a white dinner service, 
and numerous other things, until one thinks he is about to 
move into the mosque to live ; but, no, they will all be taken 
out again in half an hour and carted home, but everything is 
placed there in readiness so that if he expresses the slightest 
wish it may at once be fulfilled. 



A MEAN AND CRAFTY-LOOKING RULER. 563 

And now look! The band strikes up a martial air of 
welcome, a look of expectancy comes upon every face, and 
ten thousand necks are craned to see the carriage which 
comes slowly down the hill from the palace to the mosque. 
On the front seat of this carriage is a noble-looking man in 
splendid military costume covered with decorations, who 
appears every inch a king. But he is not the Sultan. The 
other man who sits on the back seat of the carriage, — ■ that 
mean, crafty-looking fellow, with the red beard and hooked 
nose, and the scared look in the deceitful eyes which he lifts 
to the crowd of European spectators as he passes the em- 
bassy, — that is "The Sultan of glorious Sultans, Emperor of 
powerful Emperors, distributer of the crowns of inlidel 
rulers that are seated upon thrones, the shadow of God upon 
earth. I, who am the Emperor, the Asylum of Justice and 
the King of Kings, the centre of victory; I, who, by the 
real Almighty, the Fount of happiness, am adorned with the 
title of Emperor of both lands, and, by the crowning 
grandeur of my caliphate, am graced by the title of Sov- 
ereign of both Seas." 

He dismounts at the door of the mosque, enters the 
sanctuary just as the old howjeh from the minaret overhead 
calls to noonday prayer, is absent for about half an hour, 
presumably at his worship, and then returns, takes the reins 
from his coachman and drives himself slowly up the hill to 
his palace. 

It is said that he regards this feat of driving himself 
from the mosque to the palace up a somewhat steep hill 
with ten thousand soldiers to come to his rescue if necessary, 
as a feat of surpassing courage. It is the only brave thing 
that he attempts to do, and most of his time, it is said, is 
passed in abject fear lest he lose his life, and his empire be 
wrested from his unworthy hands. 



5G4 THE SULTAN'S FEAR OF ASSASSINATTON. 

How different this from the . brave clays of old when 
Othman and Suleyman and their successors led their own 
troops in the thickest of the fray from victory to victory ! 
We can have some respect for these old warriors, cruel and 
fanatical and bloodthirsty as many of them were, — at least 
they ruled with kingty dignity and in kingly splendor. 

In the old time the Sultan had in his seraglio a first lord 
of the stable under whom were nearly seven thousand 
grooms to take care of the royal steeds. He had also a 
"Chief Falconer" and "Chief Hawker," and even a "Chief 
Sparrow Hawker." The "Chief of his Tent Pitchers" had 
under him nearly eight hundred men whose duty it was to 
pitch the Sultan's tents wherever he might wish to spend the 
day. He also had a "Chief Taster," with fifty sub-tasters 
under him who tried all the Sultan's dishes. 

His " Chief Baker " was the master of five hundred other 
bakers, and the " Chief Confectioner " had five hundred who 
were subject to him. Besides these, there was the " Master 
Yesturer," who had charge of the Sultan's clothes, and whose 
duty it was to follow him when he went abroad and scatter 
silver coins before him. The " Master of the Turbans " had 
charge of the imperial head-dress, one of which he carried in 
procession, inclining it to right or left as a salutation to the 
people. There was even a " Master of the Napkins," a 
" Master Ewer Keeper," who poured water on the Sultan's 
hands, a " Chief Turban "Winder," a " Chief Coffee Server," 
and a " Chief Barber," with many subordinates under each 
of them. We even read of a " Chief Nightingale Keeper," 
and " Chief Parrot Keeper," whose duties may be guessed 
from their very names. 

A trustworthy author who visited the royal treasure 
chambers as late as 1886, tells us that there he beheld " huge 
emeralds as large as one's hand, garnets positively plated 



RICH STORES OF COSTLY JEWELS. 



565 



with great table diamonds, maces, and daggers whose hilts 
held gems as large as hens' eggs. JeAveled aigrets and robes 
of state standing up stiff with gold and precious stones." 

All these are the relics of the more prosperous past. All 
indicate an era of splendid though barbaric magnificence. 
All show a period of virility and manly strength in rulers 
and conquering people alike. How, indeed, are the mighty 
fallen, when, from this period of grandeur, we come down to 




A TURKISH WOMAN. 



the timid, mean-faced Sultan of the present day, who dares 
not go to mosque without ten thousand soldiers to insure his 
safety, and who, with all his cruel tyranny, is ready to col- 
lapse with terror, when a foreign nation so much as whispers 
the word " ironclad " in his ear ! 

Before we leave Asia for the shores of Europe, we must 
make a brief excursion to Broussa, one of the most remark- 
able as one of the most beautiful cities of the Ottoman 
Empire. A lovely sail of half a day brings us to the port of 



566 



A BRAVE AND WISE SULTAN OF OLD. 



this ancient capital of the Moslem. Here Ave find Moham- 
medanism at its best. The mosques are spacious and mag- 
nificent. Quite an attempt is made in the line of education f 
and the magnificent scenery, the pure air, and grand old 
Olympus (not the Olympus of classic fable, but a very re- 
spectable mountain, nevertheless) which forms a background 
to the city, all seem to have left their impress upon the rul- 

Sftlfe 




a sultan's tomb. 

ing race, and nowhere are Moslems more courteous and less 
fanatical than in this their ancient capital. 

Here, as long ago as the year 1326, after a ten-years 
siege, Broussa capitulated to the troops of Othman, and here 
the great Sultan was buried soon after, for it was his dying 
wish that he should be interred at Broussa, the new capital 
of his mighty empire. The sword of Othman is still sacredly 
treasured at Constantinople, and each Sultan in his turn, as 
he comes to the throne, has the sacred blade of the founder 
of his empire buckled to his belt by wa}?" of coronation. 



THE TOMB OF "BLACK OTHMAN. 



567 



Happy would it have been for his successors, and the em- 
pire which they govern, if his descendants had been as brave, 
as far-seeing, and as simple in their habits as their great 
ancestor. Simple in his dress, his figure was imposing. 
Like Longimanus, his arms reached below his knees, his 
thighs were those of a horseman, and his prominent nose, 
black hair and beard, and swarthy hue, procured him the 
name of " Black Othman," for black is a color of honor in 
the East and indicates strength of character as well as bodily 
vigor and energy. Black Othman transmitted his physical 
characteristics to several generations of his successors, and, 
for at least three hundred years, there sat no Sultan on the 
Ottoman throne who was not distinguished for personal 
courage. 

The beautiful tomb of the brave Othman is well worth a 
visit even from Christians, who detest his creed and abomi- 
nate the ways of his descendants. Several of the other great 
Sultans are also buried at Broussa, in finely-preserved mauso- 
leums, in which the tombs are covered with heavy black 
draperies, which give a singularly dignified and sombre 
aspect to these halls of death. 




CHAPTEK XXX. 

THROUGH CLASSIC LANDS— FROM CONSTANTINOPLE TO 
THE COAST OF SPAIN — HOMEWARD BOUND. 

Off for Athens — On the Tchickatchoff — The Occident and the Orient — 
The Sharp Line of Demarcation — Tenedos and Its Wooden Horse — 
What Makes Athens Great To-day? — A Charming Journey — The 
Ruined City and its Thrilling Story — The Romantic Way of Climbing 
Vesuvius — The Lake of Fire and Brimstone — An Awful Accident 
— Where the Christians Fought with Wild Beasts — Pisa and its Bell 
Tower — The Campo Santo and its Sacred Soil — Lazy Venice and its 
Gondolas — Genoa the Superb — All that We Found of Columbus — On 
the Borders of Spain — A Royal Swimmer — Ambitious Spanish Girls — 
Too Envious to be Courteous — A Memory of Lafayette — Washer- 
women Object to Modern Conveniences — The Best Part of the Trip. 




>E must be an audacious author in- 
deed, who thinks that he can 
compel the attention of the world 
to what he may say about much- 
written Europe, when library 
shelves groan with books con- 
cerning it, and thousands of vol- 
umes are added to their list every 
year. My temerity is not of 
such large proportions as to 
undertake this task. So, in a 
single chapter, we will take our 

hasty journey from the Bosphorus to the coast of Spain. 
We will embark, if you please, my reader, as it was our 

good fortune actually to do. on the Russian steamer Tchick- 

(568) 



£B3BS$r 



ON BOARD ONE OF THE CZARS STEAMERS. 569 

atchoff, which sails from Constantinople to Athens. One of 
the finest steamers on which we have sailed since we left 
home, is this same Russian vessel with the unpronounceable 
name. The staterooms are large and airy, the table is most 
bountifully spread, the decks are clean and broad, and the 
saloons fitted up in the most elegant style of naval architect- 
ure and decoration. We are almost ready to relent and to 
shade down our deep-seated antipathy to the tyrannical Czar 
when we find that he charters so fine a steamer to carry us 
from the Orient to the Occident, for this trip is nothing less 
than such a journey. The line of demarcation is sharp and 
distinct. The Orient sweeping eastward comes as far as 
Constantinople and ends there, the Occident sweeping west- 
ward breaks with its waves of nineteenth century progress, 
unavailingly on the shores of Bosphorus. It makes but little 
impression even upon Constantinople, and none at all upon 
the country beyond. 

Not only do we go from the Orient to the Occident, but 
from the middle ages into modern times, from the twelfth 
century into the nineteenth, from conservatism, stagnation, 
retrogression, to progress, advancement, and the seething, 
vigorous life of modern days, when we journey from Con- 
stantinople to Athens. 

Past ancient Troy we sail, where, with the help of a 
powerful spy-glass and a still more powerful imagination, we 
almost make ourselves believe that we can see the excavations 
of Dr. Schliemann ; past the barren island of Tenedos, where 
in ancient times the Greeks made the wooden horse by 
means of which they conquered Troy. 

Tenedos, however, in ancient days must have been a dif- 
ferent island from what it is to-da} r , for there are not enough 
trees upon it now or upon any of the islands in the vicinity 
to make a hobby-horse for a baby, much less an animal with 



570 IN FAMOUS ATHENS. 

such a capacious interior as that in which the Greeks made 
their famous entrance into Troy. How the Greeks managed 
to get this huge wooden monstrosity across the wide stretch 
of turbulent sea which runs between Tenedos and Troy is 
another of the mysteries upon which history is silent. But 
we are not iconoclasts, and we do not wish to suggest harrow- 
ing doubts concerning cherished fables to the future genera- 
tions of classical scholars. 

We passed through the beautiful Hellespont early in the 
morning and not a great while thereafter reached the Py- 
reus, the harbor of Athens. To attempt to " do " Athens in 
the space of a few pages is such a manifestly absurd task 
that I will onty say that we stood reverently upon the Par- 
thenon while our souls did reverence to the genius of ancient 
days, embodied in the Propylaeum and the Erechtheum with 
its stately caryatides ; that we visited the Tower of the Winds 
and the arch of Hadrian and the Temple of Theseus ; that 
we stood upon the Pnyx where Demosthenes delivered his 
world-famous speeches, and that especially our souls did 
homage to the place most full of great memories to us, when 
we stood upon Mars Hill. Here, in imagination, as we 
looked off upon the historic city lying at our feet, with its 
temples and its altars and its crowded thoroughfares, filled 
as they were in ancient times, with a volatile, excitable, but 
intellectual people, we heard St. Paul saying, as he stood 
upon this very spot : " Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in 
all things ye are too superstitious, for, as I passed by and be- 
held your devotions I found an altar with the inscription : 
' To the unknown God.' Whom, therefore ye ignorantly 
worship, Him declare I unto you." 

That speech, with all that it revealed of the fatherhood 
of God, and the brotherhood of men whom God made " of 
one blood to dwell upon all the face of the earth,- ' did more 



BY SWORD AND PEN. 571 

for mankind and for the perpetuation of the memory of 
Athens, than all the works of Phidias and the conquests of 
Hadrian and the orations of Demosthenes, which also have 
made the city memorable. 

The thought is sure to come to every thoughtful man 
who stands on the heights of the Parthenon, " What has 
made this little city famous in all the ages of the world ? " 
Its situation, while beautiful, is no more remarkable than 
that of scores of other cities on the blue Mediterranean. Its 
natural advantages are not so great as those of other cities 
of ancient and modern times. The tributary country is 
comparatively barren and poor, the population was never 
large, as the great modern nations count populations. 

What, then has made Athens so famous in all the history 
of the world % There is but one answer to the question. 
She was the mother of heroes and the mother of historians. 
Brave men won her battles and true patriots ornamented her 
public squares and erected her famous buildings, and, more 
than that, poets were born to sing their virtues, and histo- 
rians to record their deeds of praise. The sword alone could 
not have made little Greece memorable among all the nations 
of the world, but the sword supplemented by the pen, the 
great deed not only done but sung, has given her an imper- 
ishable name, and attracts to her to-day scholars and lovers 
of everything that is noble and beautiful and true. 

The railway journey from Athens to Patras is one of the 
most charming which can be taken in any continent. All 
the way the railroad runs within sight of the sounding sea, 
affording most picturesque glimpses of the famous mountains 
of Greece, every one of which has been glorified in song and 
story. 

Mount Olympus and Mount Parnassus, Pentelicus, and 
Hymettus, we see them all, and what classic memories they 



572 NAPLES AND VESUVIUS. 

evoke ! Some of these memories are a little cloudy, like the 
mists which hover about the tops of the mountains them- 
selves, but, nevertheless, the mountains are very real things 
behind the mists, and so are the school-day memories which 
cluster around them very real to us, though hid by the haze 
of succeeding years. 

Another delightful journey is the sail by steamer from 
Patras to Brindisi over the Ionian Sea, a journey of some 
thirty hours, with a stop by the way at Corfu, one of the 
most lovely spots which the whole map of the world affords. 

From Brindisi to Naples is an all-day's ride over one of 
the slow Italian railways, but a ride full of enjoyment, as we 
see the fertile fields, the smiling vineyards, and the flower- 
decked pastures of sunny Italy. At last, Vesuvius, with 
a thin wreath of smoke curling from its peaks, breaks upon 
our view. "We rumble past the buried city of Pompeii, 
rattle over the tomb of Herculaneum, and go puffing into 
the great station of Naples just as the setting sun makes 
doubly glorious the always beautiful blue bay. 

Naples has few attractions in itself, but is noted for the 
beauty and interest of its surroundings ; and while Pompeii 
lies at its very door, with the paint of nineteen hundred 
years ago still fresh upon its ruined walls, with the ruts 
worn by the chariots of old still visible in its streets, with the 
shops of its bakers and its oil merchants and its wine sellers, 
just as they left them when they sold their last loaf of bread 
and flask of wine nineteen centuries ago, Naples will never 
lose its attractiveness for the traveler and the antiquarian. 

More full of unique and thrilling interest than almost 
any spot on earth is this ruined city which was overwhelmed 
by the wrath of God in a single night ; its polluted streets, 
and houses, which even now indicate depths of depravity 
that have seldom been witnessed in the history of the world, 



A LAKE OP MOLTEN FIRE. 573 

ruined and. utterly destroyed as habitations for the living. 
Surely the moralist will be excused for drawing his lesson 
from the destruction of this comparatively modern Sodom 
and Gomorrah. 

There are two ways of ascending Yesuvius. The old- 
fashioned way takes us on horseback from the guides' house 
near Pompeii through vineyards and villages, and across the 
ashes and pumice and scoriae of a hundred eruptions, to the 
base of the volcanic cone itself. Then we dismount from our 
horses, leave them in the hands of some villainous-looking 
guides who are waiting to devour as much of the substance 
of the average traveler as they can lay hands on without 
getting into jail, and then make the sharp, steep climb on 
foot to the very summit. This is not a holida}^ task, by any 
means, and I do not recommend it to those who do not have 
stout muscles and strong lungs and a good degree of physical 
endurance. It is, however, the more picturesque and ro- 
mantic method, for the other way takes us by railway to 
within a few rods of the very top. Then we pick our way 
cautiously over the steaming vent holes and across the hot 
sulphur and burning ashes until we stand on the ridge of 
the crater, and hear below us the sullen, awful "swash" of 
the lake of fire and brimstone. 

One cannot always see the seething lake itself because it 
is generally hidden by the almost continuous sulphurous 
fumes which rise from its surface. But that which is not 
visible to one sense is audible to another, and the beatino- of 
that lake of molten fire upon the sides of the imprisoning 
mountain seemed to me the most awful sound I ever heard. 
More vivid than ever before was the dreadful Scripture 
imagery which typifies of the final destruction of those who 
hate all that is good and true. 

A few days after a visit which I once paid to this crater, 



574 WHERE CHRISTIANS FOUGHT WITH WILD BEASTS. 

two gentlemen were standing on the very edge, where a little 
while before I had stood unconscious of airy danger, when 
the fumes from the pit being blown that way by a pecu- 
liarly strong gust of wind they were overcome by it. 
Blinded and suffocated they fell headlong into the dreadful 
lake which boiled and blistered beneath. The only circum- 
stance which mitigates the dreadful accident was that then* 
sufferings must have been absolutely momentary. 

When Ave reach Rome, as we shall after three days in 
Naples, how can we hope to even touch upon its grandeur 
and beauty! We are filled with the hopelessness of our 
task at the very beginning, and the longer we stay roaming 
through its miles of picture galleries, visiting its acres of 
statuary, strolling into church after church, each one of 
which is worth a week of study, roaming among the ruins of 
the palaces of a score of Caesars, we are ready to aver that 
one cannot hope to see Rome thoroughly unless he has 
months at his disposal. 

Among all the sights of ruined Rome the Colosseum 
impresses me most deeply. Here the imagination has 
full play. Here the poetic fancy can ask for nothing 
more. Story on story rise the tiers of seats for the spec- 
tators who rejoiced in the bloody tragedies of those cruel 
days. Eighty thousand people could here be accommodated, 
and in the ampitheatre upon which all these tiers of seats 
look down, how many dreadful tragedies were enacted ! 

Here came the Christians to fight with the wild beasts. 
Here came the gladiators to struggle in mortal combat, with 
never a merciful thumb raised from the spectators who 
enjoyed their agony. Here assembled the beauty and 
chivalry, the aristocracy and royalty of Rome in her most 
glorious days, but at the heart of this royalty and chivalry 
and beauty was the corrupting worm of selfishness, cruelty, 



THE LESSON OF A RUIN. 575 

corruption, and tyranny. The Colosseum is a type of all 
that is grandest and of all that was basest in ancient 
Rome. It is the living exhibition in substantial stone and 
mortar of her grandest days and her weakest days, of 
her power and her poverty alike. 

We are glad that it is now a ruin, for the Colosseum 
was always dedicated to that which was mean and base. 
We are glad that the ruin still stands, for it teaches the 
whole world that material power and grandeur and wealth, 
beyond anything which the ages have known before or 
since, are not sufficient of themselves to make a nation truly 
great or permanently powerful. 

Of course we will go into St. Peter's before we leave the 
ancient city. It is the fashion for many travelers to say that 
they are disappointed in St. Peter's, and no doubt such a 
feeling does come to one as he looks first at the unworthy 
and meaningless facade which greets him as he walks up to 
the entrance. But all sense of disappointment disappeared, 
so far as I was concerned, when I entered its vast por- 
tals and found myself beneath its mighty domes. Every- 
thing that marble and gilding; frescoing and mosaic 
work can do to make a building sublimely, grandly beautiful, 
has here been done. The wealth and genius of the ages 
have been lavished upon this wonderful church, and we do 
not wonder that it is the Mecca of every devout Catholic. 

To the Protestant, however, accustomed to the more 
severe simplicity of his own modest sanctuaries, there is very 
much that is wanting, even in this magnificent church, 
to make it all that he dreams concerning the constant 
abiding place of God. Here the Pope seems to be glorified 
more than the Master of the Pope. St. Peter is more 
conspicuous than the one who said to him, " Henceforth 
thou shalt be called Peter, for on this rock will I build 



576 A STORY OF THE CRUSADERS. 

my church," and the Virgin Mary is vastly more honored 
than her Divine Son. With an unsatisfied, hungering sense 
of want, the Protestant Christian is likely to go out from 
this gorgeous cathedral, feeling that amid all the gilding and 
painting, the statuary and the famous shrines, he has 
not found God or drawn any nearer to the Saviour's side. 

Where else shall I conduct my readers in this land of 
Italy, crowded as it is with places of supreme historic 
interest? Shall we go to Pisa and visit its cathedrals 
and its baptistry, its Leaning Bell Tower and its Campo 
Santo ? We should certainly enjoy the day there, for all 
its sights are crowded close together, and one has no 
wearying walk to take in going from one to another. 

The Campo Santo, or sacred place of burial, is to me the 
most interesting spot in little Pisa. Here, seven centuries 
ago, the Crusaders brought shipload after shipload of sacred 
soil from Jerusalem, whither they had sailed from Pisa 
when it was a great commercial port. Their ships went out 
crowded with eager, adventurous youths, many of whom, 
alas, were to lay their bones in the land of Palestine or on 
the way thither, and the ships which sailed forth bearing the 
pride and bloom of Italian chivalry came back loaded only 
with dust and ashes from the Sacred City. Fifty-three 
shiploads of this sacred soil were deposited in this great 
rectangular enclosure, and here many Crusaders and other 
famous men were buried. From the walls around the 
Campo Santo, on every side, look down pictures of Biblical 
scenes painted by the most famous artists centuries ago, 
pictures which are still bright and fresh and vivid as though 
the colors were laid on but yesterday. 

Shall we go to Florence together and visit the miles of 
picture galleries, its beautiful park and its lovely drives 
along the historic Arno? Shall we feed our souls on the 



IN COLUMBUS'S BIRTHPLACE. 577 

memories of the great deeds which were done by the great 
men of Florence in the days of her pride and strength? 
When my readers do take this journey, not in this hasty 
fashion, but in reality, they will agree with me, I am 
sure, that no days are more pleasantly spent than those that 
are devoted to charming Florence. 

But we must hurry on, not even stopping to spend a few 
lazy days in the gondolas of Venice, feeding the pigeons in 
St. Mark's Square, or watching the glass-blowers in the 
factories which line the great canal, for we must tarry at 
least a time in Genoa, the Superb. "With our souls fired 
with admiration for Columbus, Genoa presents a magnet 
quite too strong to be resisted, and yet when we reach the 
city of his birthplace, we find remarkably few memorials of 
the great discoverer. The house in which he was born, or in 
which he is said by some people to have been born, is 
situated several miles beyond the city limits, and an auto- 
graph letter in one of the museums is about the only 
authentic memorial of him which we find. 

But, after all, these material relics and memorials im- 
pressed me not nearly as much as the intangible things all 
around which are connected with his memory. Under these 
blue Italian skies the little Columbus played, and this lovely 
view of earth and sea and sky doubtless impressed his 
imagination and nourished the poetic germs within his soul, 
which made him the great discoverer of the ages. 

As we mounted to the heights of the beautiful park and 
looked off over the housetops at the blue Mediterranean 
wimpling and dimpling in the sunlight, we said to ourselves, 
"Upon these very wavelets looked Columbus. His boyish 
eyes were strained to see the furthest limits bounded by 
the whitecaps in the distance, and his eager imagination, 
perhaps, as he stood upon this very height of land, asked, 



578 ALONG THE RIVIERA. 

' What is beyond the limits of the blue sea and the white- 
caps which bound my horizon ? ' ' The answer to this ques- 
tion, which in some form or other every generous youth puts 
to himself as he grows older, was, in the case of Columbus, 
the discovery of America and the opening of a new world 
to commerce and civilization, and the religion of Christ. 

After leaving Genoa our journey took us along the 
Riviera, where charming views are marred somewhat by 
innumerable tunnels through which the railroad passes. 
Through Nice and Mentone, famous the world over as win- 
tering places for the aristocracy of Europe, through Monte 
Carlo and Monaco, the plague spot of Europe, whose wonder- 
ful natural beauties are more than matched by the unnatural 
depravity of its chief business ; through busy Marseilles, 
through Narbonne and Pau and Cette, until at last we come 
to the very borders of Spain, and, crossing the boundary 
line, we enter into the country of the haughty cavalier. 

At San Sebastian, one of the border towns, which is most 
delightfully situated on the Bay of Biscay with green hills 
surrounding it on every side, is the new palace of the Queen 
of Spain, and we were permitted to go over this abode of 
royalty from garret to cellar. Though it is a fine building- 
and worthy of the gracious queen who will occupy it during* 
the summer months, yet it is no more imposing or magnifi- 
cent than the houses of a hundred millionaires which I have 
seen in the United States. 

Some of the rooms in the palace are designed for the 
occupancy of generals in the army and the courtiers, and 
are decidedly mean and narrow. They are plainly furnished, 
only a few feet square, and frequently have but one window 
in them. The room which her Majesty herself is to occupy, 
and the adjoining room of the Baby King whose face appears 
on all Spanish postage stamps, are fine apartments, and so 



A LITTLE KING'S PASTIME. 579 

are the state parlors and banqueting rooms. But there is 
nothing extravagant or lavish, or even particularly sump- 
tuous, about the whole place. 

The most notable thing about the palace is the view from 
the front entrance. It looks out upon the beautiful Bay of 
San Sebastian, with a broad, sandy beach stretching in the 
foreground, while off in the distance is the entrance to the 
harbor with bold, precipitous bluffs on either side, crowned 
by picturesque forts and lighthouses. The queen is a fa- 
mous athlete in her way, and especially enjoys bathing in 
the surf. So strong a swimmer is she, that she is said fre- 
quently to swim out to the beautiful island in the bay, a 
good mile from the shore. The little king meanwhile plays 
upon the sand with his painted tin pail and little shovel, at 
least as happy, we hope, as any little Spanish ragamuffin 
whose privileges in sand and water and fresh air and de- 
lightful scenery are just as great as those of the small royal 
personage himself. 

The object of supreme interest to us in San Sebastian, 
however, was not the palace or any of the trappings of 
royalty, or even the most beautiful bay with its encircling 
mountains, but the Institute for Spanish girls which has here 
been planted by American missionaries. Here are gathered 
several scores of black-eyed, bright, intelligent Spanish 
maidens, who will lead the way in the education of the 
women of this county, which I believe is about to awaken to 
a new period of youth and vigor. 

Such an institution is particularly needed in this land, for 
women here, as in every Catholic country, have been system- 
atically kept in ignorance and bound by superstitious 
fears. For the first time in all the history of Spain, a few 
months ago, some of the girls from this institution dared to 
present themselves for examination at the Government uni- 



580 "advanced young women" IN SPAIN. 

versity, competing for the same honors which their brothers 
had formerly monopolized altogether. It was a great day 
for the American Institute for Girls and a prophetic day for 
Spain, for several of the girls passed the examinations and 
came off with flying colors. They were not allowed to for- 
get, however, that they belonged to an inferior sex, for as 
they went up to receive their diplomas they were hissed by 
the unchivalrous young men. This ungracious act, however, 
reacted on the heads of the young boors who perpetrated it. 
The professors of the university compelled them to offer a 
suitable and humble apology for their treatment of the girls, 
and the precedent was established that hereafter, in some 
parts of Spain at least, a young lady of intelligence and 
attainments will be recognized by the educational authorities 
of the land of Ferdinand and Isabella. 

How better could America repay the debt which she 
owes to Spain than by liberally endowing this school, 
and by aiding to establish others for the education of the 
long-neglected women of Castile? 

A very few miles from San Sebastian is the old Spanish 
seaport of Passages, a port which was once famous in its 
way, and from which Lafayette slipped away when, in 
opposition to the Avishes of the government and his friends, 
he espoused the cause of American liberty and decided to 
stand side by side with Washington and Franklin and Jeffer- 
son. For many years the entrance to the harbor has been 
almost impassable, so filled up has it become with the silt 
washed down from the mountain sides which hem in the 
narrow passage on every hand. Of late years, however, new 
attention has been paid to the harbor, dredging machines 
have made an entrance for steamers of considerable size, and 
the old place is renewing its youth. 

It retains its ancient characteristics, however, and its one 



A CONSERVATIVE OLD TOWN. 581 

street which crawls along at the base of the hillside against 
which the town is built is so narrow as to be impassable to 
wheeled vehicles and to afford scarcely room for two passing- 
donkeys. Here old Spanish customs and prejudices flourish 
with all the force of ancient times, just as though the thriv- 
ing, bustling, modern city of San Sebastian was not within 
hailing distance. Here the people live, move, and. have their 
being, bake their bread and eat their garlic and wash their 
clothes, just as they did five hundred years ago. 

The latter operation is performed by women who stand 
in the water up to their knees, and cold, icy spring water it 
is, too, while they pound and rub and beat the very life out 
of their garments on flat stones in the bed of the stream. A 
few years since, the town provided a better place for them, 
but this thoughtful provision almost provoked a riot. They 
declared that what had been good enough for their grand- 
dams was good enough for them, that they would have none 
of the new-fangled, modern wash tubs even though they 
were provided at public expense, and that they would still 
stand up to their knees in water if they chose to do so. 
The authorities had to give way, and the new and beautiful 
stone wash tubs fell into innocuous desuetude. 

We will follow Lafayette's example, and, leaving well- 
known Paris and the old mother country to those who have 
seen and described them so often, we will embark for 
America in imagination from this very Spanish port, echoing 
the sentiment which has been ringing through our hearts a 
hundred thousand times during this long journey, that no 
country is for us so precious as the land over which the 
Stars and Stripes wave, and that nothing about going 
abroad is so altogether delightful and satisfactory as the 
getting home again. 



CHAPTEE XXXI. 

OBJECTS AND RESULTS OF OUR JOURNEY — THE FAVORING 
HAND OF PROVIDENCE — LOOKING BACKWARD — HAPPY 
MEMORIES. 

The Great Object of our Journey — Australian Conventions — Unbounded 
Enthusiasm — The Y. P. S. C. E. Pennant — Happy Memories — In 
Marvelous Japan — A " United Society " for China — Among the Hin- 
dus — Obstacles in Turkey — Forbidden "Words — Arresting St. Paul 

— Black -Eyed Spanish Endeavorers — Encouragement in Paris — Good 
News from the Mother Land — Steady Growth of Endeavor Societies — 
Impressions of Missionaries and Their Work — Cruel Misrepresentations. 

— Globe Trotters' Slanders — A Diversity of Gifts — What are the- 
Hardships of a Missionary to-day? — The Most Hopeful Feature of Mod- 
ern Civilization — The Anglo-Saxon Missionary and His Noble Work — 
Saving the World through Jesus Christ. 




HE great object of the journey 
which has been described in the 
previous chapters, was the ad- 
vancement of the Christian En- 
deavor movement in foreign 
countries, and the visiting of 
missionary stations in heathen 
and Mohammedan lands, for the 
purpose of acquainting members 
of these societies in America 
more thoroughly with the needs 
and privileges of missionary 
work all the world over. 

In every particular, the journey has been more blessed of 
Providence and prospered by God's favoring hand than I 
dared to believe would be possible when we undertook it. 

(582) 



ENTHUSIASTIC AUSTRALIANS. 583 

No accident or serious detention or illness delayed us during 
our year of travel. Ko appointment was missed, no address 
failed to be delivered among the two hundred and fifty 
which made the year such a busy one. Everywhere the 
Christian Endeavor idea was received with surprising favor. 

To be sure, we went only where we were asked to go, and 
addressed meetings that had been previously arranged by 
kind friends. And yet with all these favoring circumstances, 
I did not dare to hope for such enthusiastic conventions, such 
eager throngs of earnest young men and women, and such 
large favor as was accorded to this youngest child of the 
■church, The Young People's Society of Christian Endeavor. 

In Australia the conventions were, beyond all precedent, 
large, enthusiastic, and inspiring. The greatest audience 
rooms that could be obtained in such places as Melbourne, 
Ballarat, Adelaide, and Brisbane, were crowded to their 
utmost, and the spirituality and intense earnestness and devo- 
tion of the conventions were quite as noticeable as the large 
throngs which attended them. The conventions usually be- 
gan, practically if not formally, at the railway stations, which 
were usually crowded with singing Endeavorers when we 
arrived, and who carried their good cheer and gladness and 
contagious enthusiasm with them wherever they went. 

Even the railway officials and the city authorities of the 
town often seemed to catch the spirit of enthusiastic youth, 
and accorded us courtesies and kindly consideration which 
were far beyond the merits of the humble individuals who 
came to advocate the claims of Christian Endeavor ; and yet 
we realized from the beginning of our journey to the end, 
that not the individuals who brought the message, but the 
society which they represented, was honored, and every 
greeting and welcome and hearty hand-grasp told chiefly of 
the love which the young people and their pastors and their 



584 A SIGNIFICANT WELCOME. 

fathers and mothers had for this new agency which God has 
raised up " For Christ and the Church." 

One of the most significant of these welcomes, and one 
whose kindly thoughtfulness we shall never forget, greeted 
us when first we reached the bluff headlands of Sydney 
harbor, where we saw a steam launch approaching our 
steamer, flying two pennants, from one masthead the Stars 
and Stripes, and from another a flag bearing the letters. 
" Y. P. S. C. E." From that moment to the day when, six 
weeks later, we sailed from the harbor of Brisbane for the 
port of Hong Kong, when the last sound that we heard was 
the sweet music of Brisbane Endeavorers, singing, " God be 
with you till we meet again," every hour was crowded with 
pleasant experiences, and lives as a happy memory of the 
great Island Continent. 

During the months which have elapsed between that visit 
and the date of the publication of this book, Christian 
Endeavor Societies have multiplied at a most gratif} T ing rate 
throughout all the colonies, until now there are probably at 
least seven hundred societies in this group of sister nations 
which lie under the Southern Cross, while their numbers 
are increasing quite as rapidly in the land whose people look 
up at the familiar constellations of Orion and the Great Bear. 

In the mighty land of Asia with its uncounted millions, 
in Japan, China, and India, we found a large and most en- 
couraging field also for the growth of Christian Endeavor 
societies. In Japan, that marvelous new land which is 
springing forward by leaps and bounds into the family of 
great nations, there are already some forty Endeavor soci- 
eties established in connection with the missions of the 
various Protestant denominations. Several little booklets 
have been translated into Japanese and widely circulated, 
and much hope is expressed by missionaries and native 



OUE WORK IN INDIA AND CHINA. 585 

pastors of the future efficiency of this new agency of Chris- 
tian nurture. 

In China a United Society of Christian Endeavor has 
been established with its headquarters at Shanghai. The 
constitution and other literature has been translated into 
several dialects, and two or three largely circulated Chinese 
papers give constant attention, by means of special depart- 
ments, to the work of the society and its possibilities in the 
Flowery Kingdom. 

In India much satisfactory work is being planned and 
executed. The constitution of the society has been trans- 
lated into Tamil and Telugu and Bengali and Hindustani 
and Marathi. Many vigorous societies already exist in con- 
nection with various missions, and it is hoped that a multi- 
tude of struggling communities of Christians and out- 
stations where only a few can be gathered together, and 
where there are not a sufficient number of Christians to form 
a regular church, an organization of this sort with its pledge 
and its obligations of voluntary religious service may do 
much in the way of establishing firm and steadfast the 
much-tried faith of the new converts. 

In Turkey all religious work meets with greater obstacles 
than in any other land at the present time, and the Christian 
Endeavor Society comes in for its full share of persecution 
and opposition. Many societies have been broken up, and 
many others which would have been formed have been 
delayed because of the threatening attitude of the govern- 
ment toward every possible plan for the union of young- 
people in religious work. 

A humorous story is told to the effect that a copy of the 
Epistle of Paul to the Galatians was submitted to the 
Turkish censor for his inspection. He was at once greatly 
alarmed and incensed thereby, for he interpreted it as being 



586 A HUMOROUS STORY. 

a letter to the inhabitants of Galata, which is one of the 
divisions into which the modern city of Constantinople is 
divided. In his hot wrath he at once sent a constable to the 
mission to apprehend this agitator Paul who was writing in- 
cendiary letters to the people of Galata. "When told that 
the said Paul had been dead for fully 1800 years, and thiit 
he could not answer to the summons of the Turkish govern- 
ment, and that all the people to whom he wrote had 
also been in their graves for almost two milleniums, his 
wrath cooled somewhat, and he concluded to dismiss his 
posse of constables without arresting the apostle. 

This story simply shows, as do other instances which 
were related in previous chapters, the absurd prejudices and 
stupid ignorance with which religious work of all lands has 
to contend in the Ottoman Empire, and the end of many of 
these stories is more tragic than humorous. 

Still, in spite of these obstacles, Christian Endeavor work 
and all other kinds of Christian enterprise are holding on their 
way, waiting and hoping for better times in the Dominion of 
the Turk. 

In Spain, we found among the Spanish girls and their 
teachers enthusiastic Endeavorers, and these girls Avill carry 
the plans and methods of the society, as they finish their 
education and return to their home, into all parts of the 
ancient kingdom of Castile. 

In France, too, we found very much to encourage us. A 
large mass meeting drawn from the seven Christian En- 
deavor societies of Paris, whose numbers have since been 
multiplied, greeted us in the hall of the Y. M. C. A., and 
hundreds of French Protestant pastors and religious workers 
came together in one of the halls of the McCall mission to 
talk over the adaptabilities of Christian Endeavor to their 
work and workers. 



MEMOKABLE MEETINGS. 58? 

My visit to England on this occasion, which, is not re- 
corded in the chapters of this book, since it is so difficult to 
find ''fresh fields and pastures new" in the well-traveled soil 
of the mother country, was the third which I have made 
within the last few years in the interests of the Christian 
Endeavor movement, and was by far the most encouraging 
of all. 

I had the pleasure of speaking to large and enthusiastic 
audiences in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Ipswich, 
Glasgow, Belfast, Chester, and Liverpool, and of attending 
the third annual Christian Endeavor convention of the 
British, societies — an admirable and memorable meeting. 
Everywhere I found the same spirit, devotion, and loyal zeal 
which I am accustomed to find in America, and everywhere 
pastors gave me their assurance, that though the growth of 
the society was less rapid at first than in its home-land, it 
was destined to do no less good and to become quite as im- 
portant a factor in church life in England as in America. 

Within a year of the time of this last visit, the societies 
have multiplied from less than three hundred to nearly seven 
hundred ; strong Christian Endeavor Unions have been estab- 
lished in most of the leading centers of population, and the 
outlook for the future was never so bright as to-day. 

I must add, in a few words, my general impression in re- 
gard to missionary work the world over ; for to rectify and 
clarify and intensify these impressions in my own mind and 
the minds of others who might read or hear of this journey, 
was one great object for which it was undertaken. I rejoice 
to say, that with every mile of the journey my belief in mis- 
sions and missionary work has been strengthened, my love 
for the missionaries increased, and my confidence in the final 
triumph of the religion of Christ throughout all the world 
has been more surely established. 



588 MISREPRESENTATIONS OF SHALLOW CRITICS. 

Many and cruel misrepresentations of missionaries and 
missionary work find voice in the press, and in the comments, 
of returned travelers who often return to their own land 
hostile and abusive of missionary work. I have paid my re- 
spects to these globe-trotters more than once in the course of 
these chapters, and no language is too strong with which to 
score their superficial and utterly false estimates of mission- 
ary service. 

These unsympathetic travelers who live in luxury and 
comfort at home, who go abroad simply for their own con- 
venience and pleasure, who have never sacrificed a dollar for 
the advancement of the cause of Christ, presume to criticize- 
with vulgar sneers these brave soldiers of the Cross who have 
given up home and native land and dear friends, and many 
of them brilliant prospects in life, for the love which they 
bear the Master and the men for whom He died. Patience 
ceases to be a virtue when one considers these shallow critics 
of men whose shoe latchets they are not worthy to unloose. 
To be sure, missionaries differ as good men differ everywhere 
else in intellectual capacities, in natural gifts, in education, 
and in devotion. Some are far more efficient than others. 
Some are more wholly given to their work than their fellow 
missionaries, and some are more successful and have larger 
results to show for the time and money and force which they 
expend in foreign lands. 

But this is only saying what is equally true of ministers 
and Christian people at home. There is a diversity of gifts, 
but it is also true that a genuine spirit of loyalty to Christ 
and of love to men, and a desire to lift them up, in everyway 
pervades the ranks of missionaries of the cross in all lands, 
and is their one controlling motive. During the past year I 
have visited these faithful men and women in China and 
Japan, in Northern India and in Southern India, in the Sand- 



MISSIONARIES AND THEIR WORK. 589 

wich Islands and Samoa, in Egypt and Syria, in Turkey, 
Greece, France, and Spain, and without hesitation I can say 
no nobler, more devoted, self-sacrificing, and intelligent body 
of men and women has it ever been my privilege to meet in 
any land. In wit and worth, in intellectual capacity and 
administrative ability, in intelligence and in a large, states- 
manlike grasp of the situation, their numbers cannot be 
duplicated, I believe, in any walk of life. 

They are, for the most part, well-equipped before they 
leave home ; they have been broadened by travel, polished by 
contact with many men of many minds, sweetened by love 
and devotion to Christ, ennobled by supreme and lofty life 
purposes, and are men and women who are fit to stand 
before kings, for they have felt the ennobling touch of ser- 
vice for the King of Kings. 

Much of the misapprehension of missionary work arises 
from the fact that the difficulties and hardships are not in 
these days as they were at first, largely physical and mate- 
rial. Few missionaries now suffer for lack of sufficient food 
or good clothes or convenient shelter. Some of them live 
almost as comfortably as they would live at home, and their 
abodes, clothing, and table fare are above the average of the 
debased tribes among whom many of them work. This dif- 
ference of social condition has given rise to many of the 
cruel jibes of unsympathetic and slanderous travelers, who 
accuse the missionaries of living in stately style in palaces, 
while their converts grovel in miserable hovels. 

But the object of the missionary, as I understand it, is to 
lift his convert out of the hovel, and not to degrade himself 
to the level of the heathen. While it is true that the average 
missionary' lives for the most part in comparative comfort, it 
is not true that he lives extravagantly or lavishly. He is 
always willing to go down among people for whom he works; 



590 



LAST WORDS. 



he is willing to wear their clothes, eat their coarse fare, and 
live in their filthy huts, if necessary, and he often does all 
these and more ; at the same time he is constantly trying to 
raise the people unto whom he has been sent to a higher 
level of respectability and Christian manhood. 

I am glad to have my last words in this book testify to 
the fact that missionary work of all the various Protestant 
denominations in all parts of the world is, in my eyes, the 
most promising and hopeful feature of modern civilization. 
For the enlargement of commerce, for the spread of civiliza- 
tion, for the uplifting of humanity, for the redemption of the 
world, there is no such force as that which is exerted by the 
Ansrlo-Saxon missionaries of the Cross, the ministers of the 
Lord Jesus Christ. 



.*&* 





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V 





W Oi^Ki/L/ w, «D/Las'} 








gls $wrt (Iltrmtjjlt a Utonmn's (%s. 

INTRODUCTORY. 




iHEJST a man and a woman are 
journeying " Around the World " 
together they are likely to see 
all things through different 
glasses. The man may, per- 
haps, have a clearer vision and a 
wider outlook; but the woman, 
with more leisure, and with 
more opportunities in some di- 
rections because she is a woman, 
will notice little things which 
have escaped the larger vision, 
and yet are none the less interesting. 

It is with the hope that some of the experiences and 
observations of an American woman in strange lands may 
be interesting to her sisters in the home-land, that she has 
ventured to present these glimpses of life and scenes among 
the women and children of other countries than ours, as 
they appeared to her. 



(593) 



^o«/^ ^Lcum^ 




Bs Seen Gbrougb a Woman's Bges. 



CHAPTER I. 

A WOMAN'S LIFE AT SEA — HOUSEKEEPING IN A FLOATING 
PRISON — LIFE UNDER THE SOUTHERN CROSS. 

At Sea — Housekeeping on a Small Scale — Daily Life in a Floating 
Prison — A Consoling Stewardess — Tea and Toast in a Stateroom — 
A Bed that Never Kept Still — Lucid Intervals — Moving into a New 
Home — Arranging our Belongings — Going to Housekeeping Eighteen 
Times in One Year — The Back Yard of an Ocean Steamer — Sighing for 
a Pine Stump — A Chinese Steward, A Malay Quartermaster, and an 
English Captain — Life on the Ghingtu — Under the Southern Cross — 
A Velvet-footed Steward — Doleful versus Pleasant Memories. 



|OW many pleasant memories of 
our life on ocean steamers come 
back to me as I write! After 
traveling for weeks on land, liv- 
ing in trunks meanwhile, stop- 
ping two days in this place and 
one in the next, a homelike feel- 
ing always came over me when 
we moved our worldly posses- 
sions into the little stateroom of 
a steamer and settled down to 
housekeeping for a few days. 
To be sure, it was housekeeping on a small scale, but only 
think of the delight of having one room that you can call 
jour very own for eight or ten or twelve days, and on one 
occasion even for twenty-four days. Just think of it, O ye 

(595) 




596 RESTFUL DAYS. 

housekeepers, who can spread your possessions over a whole 
house and keep them there all the time, with never a 
thought of change save that of pleasing your own fancy. 

Life and travel on land was usually a rush, a hurry, and 
bustle; conventions and tea meetings, sight-seeing, recep- 
tions and visiting, wrestling with trunks, waiting at railroad 
stations, changing cars, whirling through city streets in 
jinrikishas, or jolting in jutkahs, led us a busy life on shore. 
How welcome the change to an ocean steamer and the 
prospect of a sea voyage, long or short, after four or five of 
such busy weeks ! How quiet it seemed, as we pushed the 
steamer trunk under the berth, after taking out the favorite 
articles that would be wanted first and disposing of them in 
different places ! To be sure, my wrapper was usually the 
first thing needed, and my berth the first place I sought, 
but what of that ! After the bustle and confusion on land, 
was it not restful to spend a few days in perfect quiet on 
the berth or the lounge ? As for food, what could be more 
soothing than the cup of tea and the slice of cold toast 
served by the hands of the stewardess three times a day. 
What could be more comforting than her assurance that 
u the sea is growing smoother and probably it will be quite 
calm by to-morrow." True there are no visible indications 
that the sea is growing calmer, and you think it is quite 
probable that she only says it is from a desire to make herself 
agreeable; still, it is a comfort to have her say so, even if 
you do not believe it. All this may suggest rather a doubt- 
ful kind of rest, but it was rest nevertheless, and I always 
looked forward longingly to my floating prison. 

Besides, I frequently had lucid intervals when I could go 
on deck and enjoy life with the rest of the party that made 
up our little world. There were days when the sea was 
calm and peaceful and I could promenade up and down the 



THANKFUL FOR SMALL FAVORS. 597 

deck, and sing in my heart that old time our fathers and 

mothers sung years ago, 

" Fly like a youthful ha-a-art or roe, 
Over the hi-i-i-ils where sp-i-i-i-ces grow." 

There were rough and stormy days, it is true, when the 
ship tossed and pitched, and I lay on my back in my berth 
with closed eyes, and sighed, "Oh, for a lodge in some vast 
wilderness," or, " Oh, that I had wings like a dove." But 
even this was an episode, and if the voyage was long a few 
days of seasickness now and then served to break the monot- 
om^. Think of this, ye weary housekeepers, who can take 
your rest every night, and every day if you will, in a bed 
and keep still, and in a room which boasts at least one good- 
sized window! 

If I have learned nothing else in this long journey I have 
learned to be thankful for small mercies. 

There was always a pleasant excitement in going on 
board a steamer and starting on a new voyage. Where was 
our stateroom situated ? "Was it an outside room ? Was it 
on ihe pleasant side of the ship, where we could have the 
port open ? How far was it from the dining-room and how 
far from my seat at table? How many seconds would it 
take to go from the table to my berth if I should suddenly 
decide that I did not want any breakfast ? 

Then came the pleasure of unpacking our goods and 
settling down to housekeeping again. It was like moving 
into a new house. We looked about to see how large the 
stateroom was, what conveniences it possessed, and con- 
sidered how to make the most of them. This berth shall be 
my room ; this net which holds so many little things shall 
be my bureau ; this hook shall be my wardrobe, or " almira," 
as they call it in India. Perhaps I can even have two hooks. 

This trunk will make a good divan when it is pulled out 
36 



598 HOUSEKEEPING AT SEA. 

from under the berth, and it can be pushed under again 
when it is not wanted. This lounge shall be the spare room, 
for the use of the family, or for an occasional guest. This 
little shelf under the glass shall be the dressing-table, and 
this camp stool the easy chair. This narrow space between 
the berths and the lounge will hardly do for the parlor, but 
perhaps we'll call it the hall, and, when the divan is pulled 
out, it will do for the family sitting-room. " Now Ave are all 
settled," as a certain small boy, the little pilgrim of the 
party, always said when he had everything arranged to his 
satisfaction, and we were ready to sail. 

It is not everyone who has the privilege of going to 
housekeeping eighteen times in the course of one year, and 
each time in a different land, or, rather, on a different sea. 
The spirit moves me to write a whole chapter on the Yellow 
Sea, and a doleful chapter it would be, I am afraid. I would 
like to write a chapter on " Housekeeping at the Equator," 
or " Life on the Tchickatchoff" or " At Home on the Arafura 
Sea," or " Days in the Doldrums," but a compassionate spirit 
comes over me and I forbear. 

A certain traveler, who has recorded his experiences, 
speaks in praise of the one steamer on which he traveled, and 
his delight in coming back always to the same steamer and 
the same traveling companions ; but his experience was not 
ours, and to us a change of steamers seemed much pleasanter. 
Perhaps, however, this may not decide the question, but may 
only serve to show a commendable desire, both on his part 
and on ours, to be content in whatever state (or steamer) one 
is compelled to take, and to accept the gifts the gods provide 
and be thankful. Suppose your stateroom is small, and on 
the wrong side of the ship so that the ports must often be 
closed. Never mind, you will have better fortune next 
time, and " it's an ill wind that blows nobody good." Sup- 



THE BACK YARD OF A SHIP. 599 

pose your fellow passengers are not the most agreeable people 
in the world ? Never mind, they are only going on this 
voyage, and you will leave them at the next port. Suppose, 
on the other hand, that they are all very agreeable people, 
and you are sorry to leave them. Never mind, you will 
make other delightful acquaintances on the next steamer, 
and we shall be sure to meet them again, sometime, some- 
where ; and oh, how many delightful friends we shall have 
before the year is over ! Suppose you do not find the table 
or the service quite satisfactory. Never mind, they are sure 
to be better next time. 

Think, too, of the delights of keeping house in a different 
place each day. Oh, tired housekeeper in the dear home- 
land, did you ever weary of looking out upon the same 
sights day after clay ? Did you ever get tired of the tree in 
front of your kitchen window and wish it were a post or a 
rock, a flower-bed or a fountain? Did you ever weary of 
looking into your neighbor's back yard? Then you will 
understand how delightful it is to find your house in a new 
place every morning. If you do not like your front yard 
to-day, you can console yourself with the thought that it 
will be your back yard to-morrow. If you are not pleased 
with the Banda Sea this week, you know you will have the 
Sum Sea next week. If Thursday Island does not suit you, 
wait a day or two and you can have Friday Island, or 
Saturday Island. 

It is true that all water looks very much alike, whether 
it is the Yellow Sea or the Bosphorus, but then you can 
always assure yourself that it is. not the same, and that you 
are looking out upon a different place from yesterday. 

I must confess to an occasional wild desire to tie our 
house to a tree somewhere, and keep it still for a little while, 
and to certain unappeased longings for an old stump that I 



600 A MOTLEY CREW. 

have often looked upon as a disfiguring blot upon the land- 
scape. There were days when I should have considered that 
stump " a thing of beauty and a joy forever," if I could have 
been set down suddenly beside it. However, this only goes 
to show what discontented creatures we mortals are. When 
we have a stump we sigh for something else, and when we 
have something else we pine for a stump. Such is life ! 

I remember three or four different steamers which 
seemed to me particularly delightful. I shall never forget 
the day I climbed up from the Tarshaw — a little steam-tug 
that had brought us out from Brisbane — over a high, railing- 
and down on to the deck of the Chingtu, thence into our 
stateroom, which was to be our home for three weeks. We 
were all tired after a long series of meetings for nearly six 
weeks, and the prospect of rest was comforting. As we 
arranged our household effects in the little stateroom, what 
a delightful feeling of peace and quietness came over us I 
!No more meetings, no more hurrying to catch a train, no 
more packing and unpacking, nothing to do but to rest and 
keep house for three weeks with everything new and 
interesting, for the steward of the Chingtu was a Chinaman, 
the quartermaster was a Malay, the captain was an English- 
man, with a general disregard of his h's, and the passengers 
were mostly Chinese. 

Nothing can be more delightful than early morning in 
the tropics. After the hot night in the little stateroom 
below it was refreshing to go up on the cool deck, and, 
reclining lazily in a steamer chair, look off upon the land and 
sea, for we were inside the Great Barrier reef and were 
almost always in sight of land. Often a soft footfall on 
deck announced John Chinaman, our table steward, bringing 
a cup of delicious tea and some dainty little pieces of toast, 
hot, crisp, nicely buttered, and tempting to the appetite. 



DAILY LIFE AT SEA. 601 

At half -past eight came breakfast in the cool dining-saloon, 
with punkahs moving briskly to make a breeze, and Chinese 
stewards, in their white jackets, flitting about the room 
attending to the wants of the passengers. 

The forenoons always passed quickly with reading and 
writing and sewing, for this was an easy, lazy kind of house- 
keeping with no household cares to attend to. Before it 
seemed possible that it could be so late would come the call 
to tiffin, and we were always ready to respond, for there is 
nothing like a sea breeze to give one an appetite. Then an 
afternoon nap, a game or two of quoits on deck, a little writ- 
ing, and, almost before we know it, it is " eight bells," and 
John Chinaman again appears with more tea and toast. 
Strange as it may seem, we are ready for it again, and the 
tea is so good and the toast so hot and so daintily served 
that it would tempt the poorest appetite. 

Ding, dong, — two bells. Can it be five o'clock ? Almost 
dinner time, and we have only time enough for a little 
promenade. 

How delightful the cool, evening breeze, and what a 
gorgeous sunset ! If morning in the tropics is always 
beautiful, the long, moonlight evenings on the steamer's 
deck are no less so, with the Southern Cross looking down 
upon us ! It was hard to realize on those warm summer 
evenings that our friends at home were shivering in the chill 
November blast, while we sat lazily in our steamer chairs 
enjoying the cool soft air and dreading the descent into our 
stuffy little stateroom. 

Then there was the Empress of China with its large, 
convenient staterooms, which seemed to us like palatial 
apartments, with its broad, shady decks, and little English 
children running about under the care of their Chinese 
Ammahs. There was the Japanese steamer, the Yokohama 



602 



MEMORIES OF OUR LIFE AT SEA. 



Maru, on which we spent such a dismal Christmas on the 
Yellow Sea, and the Peru, which carried us safely through 
a Typhoon on Thanksgiving eve, and the Russian steamer 
Tchickatchoff, one of the very pleasantest steamers of them 
all, and the Victoria, and many others which might be 
mentioned. All of these floating homes of ours have pleas- 
ant memories connected with them, besides not a few gloomy 
ones. "What a fortunate thing it is that the doleful memories 
fade away and only the bright ones linger. 







CHAPTER II. 

AMONG THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN OF JAPAN — A JAPAN- 
ESE PRAYER MEETING — NATIVE POLITENESS AND ETI- 
QUETTE—MY EXPERIENCE WITH CHOPSTICKS. 

Compensations — The Brown Babies of India — The Yellow Babies of 
Japan — Queensland Lucy — A Forlorn Little Black Girl — The Hottest 
Place on Earth — Home Life in Japan — Going to Prayer Meeting in a 
Jinrikisha — A Shuffling, Awkward Gait — Where We Left Our Shoes 

— Japanese Etiquette — A Cordial Welcome — Bowing to the Floor 

— " Rock of Ages" in Japanese — An Interesting Meeting — Struggling 
with a Foreign Language — "Sayonara"to our Friends — Japanese 
Refreshments — Eating Bean Soup with Chopsticks — A Difficult 
Operation — Drinking Soup from a Bowl — Delusive Beans — New Use 
for a Sleeve — A Japanese Pillow — The Professor of Flowers. 




OME of the compensations that 
come to a woman who for the 
sake of taking a journey around 
the world has given up her own 
home, are the delightful glimpses 
she gets of other homes, and the 
pleasant acquaintances made with 
other women and children. If 
she cannot cuddle her own babies 
she can cuddle the little brown 
ones in India or Ceylon, or the 
yellow ones in China and Japan, 
and in talking with their mothers she cannot help but feel a 
sympathy with home life in other lands such as never could 
have been awakened by books or travelers' tales. 

One of my first native acquaintances was little " Queens- 

( 603 ) 



004 LITTLE " QUEENSLAND LUCY.*' 

land Lucy " (as we called her), on the Mariposa, the steamer 
which carried us from San Francisco to Sydney. Her sad 
little face was the blackest one I ever saw, and she was so 
thin and poor that I wondered if she ever had enough to 
eat. As I became better acquainted with her, I found that 
the sober face could light up with a smile, and that in spite 
of her forlorn appearance she had a comfortable home. She 
was an aboriginal Australian girl from North Queensland, 
who had been adopted by white people, who cared for her as 
if she had been their own. She was a most forlorn little 
miss to look at, however, and seemed to have very little idea 
of life as happy, rolicking children in America know it. 
During all those twenty-four days on the Mariposa, I never 
saw her run about and play like other children. She would 
sit alone most of the time with her patchwork in her lap, 
sometimes sewing a little, sometimes reading, and often with 
her hands folded, doing nothing. She seemed to be happy, 
however, in her own quiet way, and an occasional walk on 
deck seemed to be recreation enough to satisfy her. After- 
wards we saw more of these aboriginal inhabitants of 
Australia at Port Darwin. They are repulsive looking 
people, most of them as thin as skeletons, all of them with 
very black faces, but seeming happy and contented with 
their lot in life. 

It seemed to me that Port Darwin was the hottest place 
on the face of the earth, but a few European people manage 
to live there, and the natives seemed to like the terrific heat. 
Groups of mothers and children sat on the ground basking 
in the sun. The mothers seemed to be very fond of their 
black babies, and some of them were bright looking little 
tots, though none were pretty. In every other country I 
invariably found bright, pretty, attractive children, no 
matter what their color or their costume mio-ht be, but 



HOME LIFE IN JAPAN. 



605 



among all these little black babies in North Australia I did 
not see one that looked kissable or even as though it could 
be made so. 

So far as I could learn, but little is being done to civilize 
or Christianize these people, though I believe there are a few 
missionaries among them. My heart went out to those poor, 
dirty, black babies, and I wished with all my heart that I 
could do something for them. 

We had delightful glimpses 
of home life in Japan. On one 
occasion I was invited by a mis- 
sionary lady to attend a wo- 
men's prayer meeting in Yoko- 
hama, an invitation I was glad 
to accept. She called two jin- 
rikishas, which soon appeared 
at the door, and after the jinrik- 
isha men had wrapped their 
red blankets about us we started 
off. This is a comfortable way 
of traveling ; indeed, it is almost 
the only way in Japan, though 
there are now a few horses in 
Yokohama, and also in Tokio. 

How I wish the friends at 
home could have seen the people we met that afternoon! 
The demure Japanese maidens with their pretty costumes 
and obis, shuffling along on their wooden shoes ; the little 
-boys and girls with, babies tied on their backs, — the babies' 
heads bobbing about in every direction as the children ran 
and played ; the old women with their wrinkled faces and 
their black teeth ; the jinrikisha men waiting at every cor- 
ner, standing by their little carriages or sitting between the 




A JAPANESE MOTHER. 



006 



AN ANIMATED HAYSTACK. 



shafts with their gay blankets wrapped about them ; and 
occasionally a stylish Japanese lady out for a ride, or an 
Englishman out for a walk. 

It began to rain a little while we were upon this our first 
journey in a jinrikisha, and while we were quite well pro- 
tected by the covering overhead, our carriers protected 
themselves by putting on their rain-coats — not mackin- 
toshes, dear reader, or rubber 
monstrosities such as we wear 
at home, but a cheap and con- 
venient affair made of rice- 
straw, which sheds the water 
like the feathers of a duck. 
Thus thatched, our jinrikisha 
A man looked like an animated 
haystack. His rain cloak cov- 
ered him almost from head to 
heels. In the crowded street 
he was continually shouting, 
at the top of his voice, " Hi- 
hi," which may be translated 
into English, I suppose, as 
"Look out there," "Get out 
of the way," in order to clear 
a passage for our little procession. 

Some of the Japanese maidens who passed us in the 
street were very pretty, though I wished they might learn 
to walk more gracefully instead of shuffling along in an 
awkward manner in their clumsy wooden shoes. 

After a half -hour's ride, we arrived at last at the private 
house where the class-meeting was to be held. Before 
entering we sat on the doorstep, took off our boots, and put 
on some soft felt slippers which we had brought with us. 




A JAPANESE MAIDEN. 



■ ". ■■ 




AT A JAPANESE PRAYER MEETING. 609 

As soon as we were inside the house, I understood why cus- 
tom required us to take off our boots, for the floor, which 
was covered with dainty, soft straw matting, was immacu- 
lately neat and clean. 

Japanese women wear wooden shoes, which are held on 
by a strap across the top of the foot and are easily slipped 
off at the door ; they wear only stockings on their feet while 
they are in the house. 

A little company of women sat on the floor waiting for 
us. They politely pointed to some cushions which had been 
placed ready in anticipation of our coming, whereupon we, 
too, sat down on the floor. It was a cordial Japanese wel- 
come, our hostesses bowing down until their foreheads 
touched the floor. We returned the salutation as well as we 
could, though it was not easy to do it gracefully. 

The meeting opened by singing the hymn, "Rock of 
Ages." My hymn book contained a translation of the hymn 
in Japanese, and I joined with the others in singing: 

" Chiyo lieslii iwa yo, 
Ware wo kakushi ne, 
Sakareshi waki no, 
Mizu to ckishio ni, 
Waga tsumi toga wo, 
Arai Kiyomeyo." 

I realized as never before that we were all children of 
the same Heavenly Father and that Christian men and 
women owe something to their brothers and sisters in other 
lands, whether we recognize the obligation or not. 

Christ's last command, "Go ye into all the world and 
preach the Gospel to every creature," simply means, find out 
your brothers and sisters everywhere, help just as many of 
them as you can, tell them of their Heavenly Father and of 
His love for them. I wish that those people who think mis- 



G10 MY FIRST LESSON IN JAPANESE. 

sionaries are not accomplishing anything could have been 
present at this little meeting ! 

One after another Japanese woman took part. They 
spoke earnestly and freely of their religious experiences. I 
could not understand their words, but I could see the rever- 
ent spirit they showed and could unite with them in prayer. 

When I was asked to speak a few words to them I re- 
alized the difficulty missionaries experience in struggling 
with a foreign tongue. It is never easy to speak through an 
interpreter. As this was my first day in Japan I had not 
learned even one word of their language. The meeting 
closed with another hymn, and after many salutations and 
much bowing we departed. 

Sitting on the doorsteps once more, we put on our boots, 
and my missionary friend turned and said to our hosts, 
"Sayonara" (good-bye). I thought I could manage as much 
as that, so I, too, said "Sayonara," and the good sisters 
laughed and bowed and seemed much interested. 

Afterwards I visited other Japanese homes, and all were 
attractive places. Clean, white, soft matting on the floors, 
the ever-present vase of flowers, the pretty screens, even the 
absence of furniture was pleasant to one who had been 
accustomed to see so many over-furnished and over-decorated 
American homes. 

I cannot say that I enjoyed Japanese refreshments. I 
took several lessons in the use of chopsticks, but never be- 
came proficient in managing them. It must require years 
of practice to use them skillfully and gracefulh r . 

I remember especially one experience soon after we 
reached Japan. I had been at a woman's prayer meeting 
and at the close refreshments were brought in. We sat on 
the floor in true Japanese style, not a very comfortable 
fashion for one who is not accustomed to it. Our hostess 



AN EMBARRASSED GUEST. 



611 



served refreshments on little square trays of lacquer work, 
setting one tray on the floor in front of each guest. On 
each tray was a little bowl of bean soup, a pair of chop 
sticks, a cup of tea, some little cakes, two oranges, and four 
persimmons. I looked at mine in despair, for I was not 
hungry and did not know just how much native etiquette 
required me to eat. 

Evidently the bean soup was the thing to begin with. I 
watched the others and then began on mine as they did on 




JAPANESE REFRESHMENTS. 



theirs, eating the beans and the rice cakes with the chop- 
sticks and drinking the soup from the bowl. The rice cake 
was too big to eat whole and it was certainly rather hard to 
manage with the chopsticks. Moreover the soup was sweet- 
ened, and as I prefer salt and pepper in soup, I did not en- 
joy it very much. 

However, I struggled with my chopsticks and fished out 
as many beans as I could, and drank the soup. But those 
beans were a delusion and a snare. After wrestling with 
the chopsticks and at last catching a bean I would raise it to 



612 



CKOPSTICK GYMNASTICS. 



my lips, my mouth would open to receive it — and down 
would go the bean into the soup. Then I would drink a 
little soup and try again. I succeeded in capturing several 
beans, but it was the work of time and patience, and at last 
I gave it up ; for I found that the others had all finished 
theirs and had leisure to observe my frantic efforts. 

The tea was very strong, without milk or sugar, but it 
was served in such dainty china cups that one could hardly 




WASHING DAY IN JAPAN. 



refrain from drinking it. The little cakes, too, were good, 
and the oranges and persimmons delicious, but must I eat 
them all? 

As I watched the other guests, I saw that they ate what 
they pleased and put the rest in their sleeves. My sleeves 
were not large enough to be very useful in that way, but 
my missionary friend produced a handkerchief which she 
had thoughtfully provided for the occasion, and the left-over 
dainties were carried home. 

After we had partaken of refreshments came the leave- 



A CEREMONIOUS LEAVE-TAKING. 



613 



taking, which could not be hurried. One at a time the 
ladies rose and bowed to the floor, first before the hostess 
and then before each of the other guests. As there were 
twenty -five or thirty ladies present it was some time before 
the proper amount of bowing was done ; but at length the 
last farewell was spoken and stepping into our jinrikishas 
we were trundled through the narrow streets and back to 
our home. 

I have never experi- 
enced sleeping in a Jap- 
anese bed, but I saw a 
good many of them and 
they looked inviting. 
Thick comfortables were 
laid on soft, white straw 
matting, but the hard, 
round pillow did not seem 
conducive to rest. The 
Japanese wooden pillow 
never had any attractions 
for me, though unless one 
tries to copy the fearful 
and wonderful style of 
hair-dressing adopted by many Japanese women there is no 
need of using it. 

A missionary school in any foreign land is always an in- 
teresting place. I remember going into one of them in 
Japan just at the time when the floral professor (if that is 
his title) was giving lessons in the arrangement of flowers. 
It was a pretty sight to watch a demure Japanese maiden as 
she took up a little flower stalk, or a dry twig broken from 
a leafless tree, and tried it first in one position and then in 
another, turning her head prettily to one side and then to 




STREET CHILDREN OF JAPAN. 



614 THE ART OP ARRANGING FLOWERS. 

the other, all the time looking anxiously at the flower to 
study the effect, while the professor looked gravely on or 
offered an occasional suggestion. 

From one pupil to another the professor went just as I 
have seen a teacher of drawing go around among his pupils, 
giving a word of praise here, offering a suggestion there, or 
a criticism somewhere else. How earnestly the girls worked 
at their task, and how pleased they were with a word of 
commendation ! 

At first, one is inclined to question whether their time 
might not be more profitably employed ; but as I saw the 
results of their skillful and artistic work in the graceful ar- 
rangements of flowers, and thought of some of the useless 
fancy work I had seen girls do in American homes, it 
seemed to me that this part of a Japanese maiden's educa- 
tion is worthy of all praise and could well be followed by 
girls of other lands. Such a tasteful arrangement of flowers 
w r as new to my American eyes. Who would have thought 
that four or five dry twigs broken from a leafless tree would 
make such an artistic bouquet, or that a vase with only 
three sprays of chrysanthemums could be so beautiful ? 

After looking at these dainty vases, each one holding but 
three or four sprays and only one kind of flower, each spray 
arranged with careful reference to the others and all droop- 
ing in the most graceful manner, — how coarse and awkward 
our great round American bouquets seemed, with all kinds 
of flowers, arranged often without the slightest regard to 
color or harmony. I shall never look at another bouquet 
without thinking of the beautiful flowers, always artistically 
arranged, that can be seen in so many homes in Japan. 

Twice a week, in some of the schools, the girls spend an 
hour with the floral professor in studying this science ; for it 
is a real science as they take it up, and there are definite 



NOT FAR BEHIND THEIR SISTERS. 



615 



rules governing not only the arrangement of each flower 
spray, but its relation to all the other sprays and to the vase 
that is to hold them. 

Let it not be thought, however, that this is the only or 
most important study taken up by the Japanese girls. 
Many of these mission schools would rank well with our 
own high schools and seminaries at home, and the girls at 
Kobe College or the Doshisha would compare very favor- 
ably with the girls at "Wellesley or Smith or Vassar. 




37 



CHAPTEE III. 

AMONG THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN OF INDIA — NATIVE 
DRESS AND ORNAMENTS — LIFE INSIDE A RICH HEATH- 
EN HOME — HEATHEN DOLLS, BRIDES, AND WIDOWS. 

Children in Ceylon — Persistent Little Beggars — Curly-Headed Karo — 
"My so Poor" — Pretty Brown Babies — Little Hands Stretched out 
for Alms — Ceylon Dandies — Picturesque Waiters — A Race of Beg- 
. gars — Tipping an Army of Attendants — Starting on a Journey at 
Three o'clock in the Morning — A Wagon Ride of Seven Miles in the 
Moonlight — Through the Streets of Vellore — Arrival at a Mission 
Bungalow — A Native Girl's Boarding School — A Bridal Trousseau in 
Red and Yellow — Life Inside a Heathen Home — Our Reception by the 
"Bo" — A Peep into the "Baboo's" Apartments — A Display of 
Jewelry — An American Doll in India — A Heathen Doll — Mrs. Grundy 
in a Zenana — Ten-Year-Old Brides — Child Widows. 




NE does not always realize, when 
looking at the little spot on the 
map marked "Ceylon," what a 
big island it is. In Colombo I 
was much interested in the little 
brown-faced, black-eyed children, 
many of them beggars, and the 
most persistent, irresistible beg- 
gars I ever met. Whenever any 
of them intercepted me in my 
walks I was wholly at their 
mercy, for it was almost impos- 
sible to say " no " to such winsome, tiny pleaders. 

I remember especially one small maiden who told me her 
name was Karo. Her tangled curly hair fell to her 
shoulders, her black e} T es sparkled, and her merry brown 

(616) 



A MERRY LITTLE BEGGAR. 



617 



face made a most interesting picture. She wore a bright red 
cloth, gracefully draped, and her brown arms and hands 
were covered with bracelets, bangles, and rings. 

She was among the first to greet us when we left the 
steamer, and persistently followed us to our hotel, which 
was only a few steps away, begging all the time. " Mama, 
give my a penny, my so poor. 
Please, mama, just one penny. 
I make you salaam, you just 
give one penny, my very hun- 
gry, my so poor, you got plen- 
ty money, my so hungry." 
Then she would draw down 
the corners of her mouth and 
put on a pensive look, and in 
spite of herself would break 
into a merry smile. She did 
not appear to be suffering 
from hunger, neither was she 
very poor as one reckons pov- 
erty in Ceylon, yet it was 
almost impossible to resist her 
importunities. She was quick 
to see my helplessness and was 
always lying in wait for me. 

The little brown babies in Ceylon were attractive, too. 
Almost every woman carried a baby sitting astride her hip, 
while she threw one arm around it to keep it from falling, 
and the little creatures looked around with as much interest 
and wonder as any American baby would show. 

It was simply impossible to pass them by without speak- 
ing to them, and at least patting their chubby hands. 
Generally the little hand opened for a penny, for they learn 




COLOMBO CHILDKEN. 



618 



MEN IN GIRLISH ATTIRE. 



to beg before they learn to walk. It is comparatively easy 
to resist a larger beggar, but when a little hand is stretched 
out for alms the temptation to give is very strong. 

The people in Colombo are all interesting, because so 
many different nationalities are represented — Hindus, Por- 
tuguese, Malays, Singhalese, and many others, each one 
seemingly more picturesque than the others. Many of the 

men wore their hair lono- and 
done up in a pug behind, while 
others wore round combs on 
the top of their heads, such as 
little girls at home often wear 
to keep their hair out of their 
eyes. Imagine a tall, full- 
bearded, imposing looking 
man, brown faced and bare- 
footed, dressed in a white jack- 
et, with a plaid skirt reaching 
down to his knees, a round 
comb on the top of his head, 
and a generous pug behind. 
This is a picture of all the 
waiters at the hotel, and they 
make the dining-room so pic- 
turesque that there seems to 
be no need of using other decorations. 

Then there are men with long, black, curly hair parted 
in the middle, and falling in ringlets on their shoulders, and 
young men of eighteen or nineteen, who look so much like 
girls that it is hard to tell whether they are men or women. 
All wear ear-rings, and many of them wear bracelets, too. 
One man was adorned with half a dozen silver bangles hang- 
ing from each ear, just such bangles as young ladies in 




A HAPPY MOTHER. 



FIVE MILES IN A LITTLE BOAT. 



619 



America would wear for bracelets. The babies wear little 
or no clothing, just a string of beads around the neck, and 
sometimes a string around the waist, but plentifully decorated 
with bangles and bracelets. 

The voyage from Colombo to Tuticorin is short, and it 
hardly seemed worth while to unpack our goods and set up 
housekeeping again just for a single night. Everyone had 
promised us a rough passage, but we were wonderfully 




PITIFUL LITTLE CREATURES. 



favored and succeeded in getting across without seasickness 
or tribulations of any kind. 

It was a trial to me to have to anchor five miles from 
land and go ashore in a small boat. The water was rough, 
but we all survived a thorough shaking up and rejoiced to 
find ourselves safe on terra firma again. 

What a difference all at once in the people and their cos- 
tumes ! The pretty babies, merry children, and curly-headed 
men had vanished, and in their places were men, women, and 



620 FEEING A REGIMENT. 

children, with brown faces, to be sure, but neither good look- 
ing nor picturesque. The men were dressed in white cloth, 
instead of bright red skirts, and the babies were most pitiful 
little creatures. The women and girls were adorned with 
cheap brass finery, ear-rings, finger-rings, toe-rings, anklets, 
bracelets, necklaces, and nose jewels, all in such abundance 
that they reminded us of the old nursery rhyme, 

"Kings on her fingers and bells on her toes, 
And she shall have music wherever she goes." 

There were no English-speaking people to be found, and 
we were not well versed in Tamil ; but by means of gestures 
and the use of vigorous English, we succeeded in eno-agino; 
some of the natives to carry our luggage to the custom house, 
and then to the station, and after a hasty tiffin and a ride 
through the hot, dusty little town, we were glad to find our- 
selves seated in the train for Madura. 

Then what a retinue of men gathered around us begging 
for remuneration for some real or fancied service which they 
had rendered us ! There were the four men who had brought 
our luggage to the station ; the man who gave us our tiffin ; 
the man who waited upon us at table ; the man who cooked 
the food ; the men who stood by and watched us eat it ; the 
punkah-wallah, who pulled the punkah for us ; the man who 
stood by our luggage while we were gone to tiffin ; the man 
who drove us around the town ; the men who lifted our lug- 
gage from the platform into the car ; the man who picked 
up a key which had been dropped ; the man who stood and 
looked on while he did it ; to say nothing of all the men who 
wanted to do something for us, and who also wished to be 
remembered. 

Fortunately none of them expected a large sum, and they 
were paid off and dismissed just as the train started on the 
long, slow journey to Madura. 



A TRIP TO VELLORE. G21 

A visit to the girls' boarding school at Yellore afforded a 
glimpse of girl life in India at once interesting and instruct- 
ive. We started from Madanapali at three o'clock in the 
morning. The boys of the mission school were up, even at 
that early hour, to see us off, and, escorting us to the gate, 
they sung us a farewell song as we started off in the moon- 
light for the seven-mile drive to the railroad station, where 
we arrived just after sunrise. 

The cars of the South Indian railway are not the most 
comfortable in the world, and after a long, hot, dusty ride, 
we arrived at Yellore at three o'clock in the afternoon. To 
one who only looks at the map, the two little dots which 
stand for Madanapali and Yellore look very near together, 
but the journey takes nearly twelve hours. 

After lingering around the station, wondering how we 
were going to find our missionary friends, we were accosted 
by a native, dressed in a white cloth and a white turban, 
who held a piece of paper in his hand. He could not speak 
a word of English, nor we of Tamil, but as the paper bore a 
familiar name we took it for granted that he had been sent, 
and followed him to a carriage which stood near by with 
seats for three. 

He indicated to us by gestures that we were to get in and 
drive, and although we had no idea which way to go we 
seated ourselves in the carriage and drove off, the native 
running on behind or on one side, occasionally going on in 
front to clear the way. After a delightful drive through 
the cool, shady streets of Yellore, we drew up at last in 
front of the mission bungalow, where a cordial welcome 
awaited us. 

The Girls' Boarding School numbers about one hundred 
and fifty girls from fourteen to twenty years old. If the 
mission schools of India had done nothing else they would 



622 BOARDING SCHOOL GIRLS. 

be deserving of liberal support for having saved so many 
girls from the evils of child marriage. But that is very 
little compared with what the missionaries have done and 
are doing for the girls and women of India. 

Some of the older girls were getting ready to be married, 
and were making their wedding skirts of bright yellow clo'th 
with large red figures. Others were busy with their books 
or their sewing. 

A run over the building, and a peep into the sleeping 
rooms, dining-room, kitchen, and school-room followed. 

All the girls sleep in one large room. Each bed consists 
of a long, wide board over which is laid a piece of straw 
matting. The board is laid on the floor, the matting is 
thrown over it and the bed is made. Each girl has also 
a sheet and a blanket that she can use if the weather is cool. 
A large brass dish, about the size and shape of a wash basin, 
and a brass drinking cup, comprise all the dishes furnished 
to each girl. Rice, curr}^, and plantains constitute the usual 
food. They are neat in their habits, and although they eat 
with their ringers, they do so in the prettiest and daintiest 
manner. As for clothing, all they really need is a cloth of 
any bright color, which they know how to drape veiy grace- 
fully. Many of them, however, do wear a skirt as well as a 
cloth. 

Toe rings and anklets seem to answer all the purpose of 
shoes and stockings. 

These girls receive a fair education, learn to sew and to 
care for their homes and families, and best of all, most of 
them return to their homes as Christian girls. 

Going one day with a missionary friend in Calcutta to 
visit some of her Zenana friends, I had a rare opportunity to 
;see life in a rich heathen home. The house was a large 
three-story one with an open court in the center into which 



THE "BO" AND HER TREASURES. 623 

rooms opened from all sides of the building. A servant 
answered our knock at the door, and in reply to our 
inquiries told us that the " bo " would be glad to see us up 
stairs. I wondered why the " bo " did not come to meet us, 
but soon discovered for myself that it would not have been 
proper for anyone in her scant attire to come downstairs. 

She met us at the top of the stairs and invited us into her 
private apartments on the third floor. She was proud of 
her parlor, which was furnished with three chairs, a mirror, 
and a book-case with glass doors, in which she kept her 
special treasures and bric-a-brac, consisting of little pewter 
and china tea sets, toy match-safes, cheap vases and images ; 
and on the top shelf, far out of reach of little fingers, was 
an American doll which had been given as a prize for regu- 
lar attendance and good behavior at the mission school. 
The little owner of the doll looked at it wistfully, but she 
was never allowed to touch it. " Do you ever play with 
it ? " I asked, through the interpreter who accompanied us. 
" JSTo, she only looked at it." When I asked if she had a 
doll that she did play with, she brought me such a poor con- 
sumptive image of green and red clay that my heart was 
moved with pity, not only for her but for the little brown 
maidens all over India, who know so little of the delights of 
childhood. 

" Would I like to see her jewelry ? " the mother asked me. 
Of course I would. Whereupon, she brought forth her jewel 
box, and spread before us such an array of gold and silver 
and precious stones and strings of pearls rarely seen outside 
of a jewelry store. There were rings, bracelets, anklets, 
nose jewels, earrings, finger rings, and chains, most of them 
of solid gold or silver. The heavy bracelets were of solid 
gold, and so were the costly anklets and earrings which 
looked as though they would be burdensome to wear. 



624 "MRS. GRUNDY" IN INDIA. 

" "Would I let her look at my jewelry ? " she asked. Cer- 
tainly I would. I showed her my watch and plain gold 
ring, remarking, that while her ornaments were very pretty, 
I should think they would be troublesome to carry, adding, 
that mine were all I cared to wear. 

" Yes," she said reflectively, " Your way is the best and 
my bracelets and anklets hurt me, and I do not like to wear 
them very often, but must sometimes or people would not 
know I had them." So I found that even in the Zenana 
Mrs. Grundy holds sway. 

Before we left the " bo " invited us into the " baboos " 
apartments, which were on the second floor and were much 
more elegant than his wife's. She also showed us her son's, 
room, and a poorer, smaller one where her little daughters 
slept. Then escorting us to the top of the stairs, she bade us 
good-bye, and we were left to find our way out alone. 

So we left this poor " bo " to live her secluded life, the 
monotony of which was broken only by combing her hair, 
doing a little embroidery, gossipping with neighbors who 
chanced to call, and looking at her jewelry. 

We were in India in February, the popular month for 
weddings, and almost every day we heard the sound of music 
announcing a wedding procession, and often saw the youth- 
ful bridegroom and his tiny bride. My heart was moved 
with pity for these little brides. The little widows, too, 
aroused my deepest sympathy. Just think of it, mothers at 
home ! Think of a ten-year-old widow, doomed to a life of 
misery and woe, because it is supposed to be her fault if her 
husband dies. When I think how we cherish and guard our 
own daughters at home, doing our best to keep sorrow and 
trouble away from them, and then remember these poor 
little children, my heart cries aloud for help to rescue the be- 
nighted womeD and innocent children of India. 



CHAPTEK IV. 

A WOMAN'S JOURNEY ACROSS TURKEY IN A WAGON — A 
MEMORABLE NIGHT IN A TURKISH KHAN — TURKISH 
VILLAGE LIFE — INTERESTING PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 

Learning by Experience — My Traveling Companions — "Coming out 
Strong " — Mark Tapley's Opinion of the Sea — Our First Experiences in 
a Turkish Custom House — Searching for Concealed Books and Papers 
— A Novel Cavalcade — In a Turkish Khan — A Memorable Night — 
Rooming with Donkeys, Camels, and Horses — Our Wash Basin — 
Over the Taurus Mountains — An American Spring Wagon in Asia 
Minor — A Dismal Prospect — Filth and Dirt Everywhere — Sickening 
Sights in Village Streets — Hobson's Choice — In a Native House — 
Putting an Armenian Baby to Bed — A Cheerful Infant — A Peep into 
Paradise — Dirty Turks — Eating out of the Same Dish with Them — 
A Plague of Fleas — Some Pointed Questions. 



T is hardly possible for women in 
America, accustomed to journey- 
ing in express trains and luxuri- 
ous drawing-room cars, to under- 
stand just what a journey of sev- 
eral hundred miles across Turkey 
in a wagon was to the one" lone, 
lorn woman " who accomplished 
it, and whose companions were 
seven men ! How she counted up 
the comforts and blessings of life 
in the homeland, and how often 
she resolved, that if she ever lived to see her native land 
again she would never complain of any hardships or tribula- 
tions which come to an ordinary housekeeper in America ! 
How many lessons she learned of thankfulness for small 

(625) 




626 "jolly" experiences. 

mercies ! How soon she learned, too, that it was possible to 
live without a good many things that most people count 
among the necessities of life. 

The whole trip across Turkey from the landing at Mersin 
to our departure from Constantinople, was what Mark Tap- 
ley would have called " jolly." " I'm always a thinking," 
said that cheerful philosopher, " that with my good health 
and spirits it would be more creditable in me to be jolly 
where there's things a going on to make one dismal. It ma} r 
be a mistake of mine, you see, but nothing short of trying 
how it acts, will set it right. I don't believe there ever was 
a man as could come out so strong under circumstances that 
would make other men miserable as I could, if I could only 
get a chance." 

Some of our experiences on the Mediterranean Sea were 
very like Mark Tapley's description of life at sea. 

" The sea," he continues, " is as nonsensical a thing as 
anything going. It never knows what to do with itself. It 
hasn't got no employment for its mind, and is always in a 
state of vacancy. Like them polar bears in the wild beast 
shows, as is constantly nodding their heads from side to side, 
it never can be quiet, which is entirely owing to its uncom- 
mon stupidity," 

" Is that you, Mark \ " asked a faint voice from another 
berth. 

" Its as much of me as is left, sir, after a fortnight of 
this work," Mr. Tapley replied. " What with leading the 
life of a fly ever since I've been aboard (for I've been perpet- 
ually holding on to something or other, in an upside down 
position), what with that, sir, and putting a very little into 
myself, and taking a good deal out in various wa} T s, there 
ain't too much of me to swear by. It is creditable to keep 
up one's spirits here. Virtue's its own reward. So's jollity." 



RUDE CUSTOM HOUSE OFFICIALS. 627 

To at least one of the three pilgrims, the Mediterranean 
Sea has left some jolly memories. The landing at Mersin 
was " jolly " ; trying to walk down the steps from the steamer 
into the little boat which takes passengers ashore, was not the 
easiest thing in the world ; the tossing about on the rough 
waves, and the landing at the steps, and the rough greeting 
from the Turkish Custom House officials, all these things 
were sufficiently "jolly". 

No one who has not tried it can quite realize how trying 
to a woman's soul was the treatment given to those trunks 
in that Turkish Custom House. Unfortunately for the pil- 
grims, one of the first discoveries made by the inspectors was 
a book. Then, alas for the travelers, and alas for the trunks ! 
Such rummaging, such unrolling of bundles and opening of 
boxes and packages, such searching for concealed books or 
papers, until at last every book had been seized, and our 
crumpled clothing and crushed bundles and packages were 
tossed back into the trunks in one confused mass ! From the 
first moment those rude inspectors opened our trunks until 
our dismantled and disheveled belongings were thrown into 
them again, one woman lost all the respect she ever had for 
the Turkish government. And that experience in the Cus- 
tom House was only a sample of all the courtesy and kind- 
ness, or the lack of it, that was shown to the travelers by 
Turkish officials in all that memorable journey across the 
country. 

I think we all breathed a great sigh of relief when at last 
we shook the dust of Constantinople from our feet, and 
sailed away through the Dardanelles to Italy and the Ionian 
shores. 

The journey began at Tarsus, that ancient city where 
Paul was born. The wagon, which was a palatial affair for 
Turkey, was very much like an emigrant's wagon, a large, 



628 THE "emigrant train." 

heavy, baggage wagon with a white canvas top. The pro- 
cession started off in great style, first the Turkish "Zabtieh" 
" saddled, bridled, and fit for the fight," as the nursery 
rhyme has it, then the white-covered wagon which carried 
the three pilgrims and their missionary friend who was also 
guide, conductor, and driver, with bedding and food enough 
to last the four for a week; and last, the clumsy native 
wagon which carried the trunks, two Turks for drivers, and 
Ali, our Turkish servant and trusty helper. 

The jouncing and jolting and the thousand and one dis- 
comforts, big and little, soon began to make themselves felt, 
and we realized that we had a chance " to come out strong." 

Twenty or twenty-five miles a day would not seem to 
the American mind to be much of a journey, but it made up 
in quality what it lacked in quantity. When at noon the 
wagon drew up before a Turkish khan, it was a great sur- 
prise, to one of the wayfarers at least, to be. invited to alight 
and go inside to eat dinner. 

What ! go into such a place as that, eat dinner there, rest 
there ! Never, so long as she had the spirit of a woman 
would she so demean herself ! " Come one, come all, this 
rock shall fly from its firm base as soon as I," was the feel- 
ing in her heart as she meekly answered, " Would it not be 
pleasanter to sit right here in the wagon and eat our lunch 
in the open air ? " 

Her suggestion was accepted and the first dinner was a 
pleasant picnic lunch. But when twilight came and the 
wagon drew up before another khan even more unattractive 
in its appearance than the first, and a dismount was 
inevitable, the one forlorn woman in the party felt like a 
veritable " Mrs. Gummidge " when she found it was really 
expected, not only that she would go into such a place, but 
that she would eat her supper and sleep there. 



A NIGHT IN A TURKISH KHAN. 629 

However, there was no help for it, and she meekly 
accepted the situation, and gathering her skirts about her, 
she tiptoed her way through the dirty stable-yard into a 
little low, dark room opening out of it, and tried to be 
"jolly". 

Who shall describe that first night in a Turkish khan ! 
It is impossible for any American woman to appreciate the 
situation. 

Imagine a little, low stone building mostly under ground, 
with a square courtyard in the middle, out of which three 
rooms open. One of these rooms was assigned to the pil- 
grims, one to the Turkish drivers and a few other Turks, and 
the third to the donkeys and camels and horses. 

Can you imagine what the best room in the khan is 
like ? The carpet is of a dark brown color and is what is 
commonly known as dirt. If our visit had happened to be 
in rainy weather it would have been mud. 

There was one small mercy to be thankful for, it did not 
rain. Along each side of the room, about two feet from the 
floor, were wooden platforms about four feet wide with just 
room enough to walk between them. On one of these plat- 
forms we set up a narrow cot bed, and arranged our 
trunks, boxes, and food ; for all our valuables must be 
kept in the same room with us or they would probably 
be stolen. On the other platform were two other tipsy 
cot beds which also served for sofas and tables. 

The walls of the room were of rough stone and mortar, 
frescoed with smoke. The ceiling was of rough rafters also 
frescoed with smoke. The chandelier was a tallow candle. 
This room was to be not only sleeping-room, but sitting-room 
and dining-room and parlor for all of us ! The other occu- 
pants of the room were fleas and other objectionable room- 
mates. This room was a fair sample of the quarters in 



G30 THE WEARIEST WOMAN IN TURKEY. 

which we ate, and slept every night during the whole 
journey across Asia Minor. There was abundant oppor- 
tunity " to come out strong ". 

In the morning there was sometimes a mountain stream 
to wash in, and that was a great luxmy. Oftener there was 
a tin or brass vessel, something like a teapot, from which a 
little water could be poured on our hands and an unsatis- 
factory apology for a bath could be obtained. 

Nevertheless, the journey over the Taurus mountains 
was delightful and interesting, and the scenery was grand 
enough to make up for all the weariness, discomfort, and 
annoyance. All that any wagon could do, that wagon did ; 
but there are limits to the possibilities of even an American 
spring wagon in Asia Minor, and when the road was 
absolutely impassable, as was frequently the case, we were 
obliged to walk. Anyone who could have looked across the 
lands and seas at the close of the last day of that wagon 
journey would have seen one of the most forlorn-looking 
women in Turkey. 

After traveling for days across a barren, treeless plain, 
we at last saw indications of approaching civilization, and it 
was evident that we were drawing near to the land of 
railways. The villages became more frequent and life more 
interesting. We had been riding all day from six o'clock in 
the morning till six o'clock at night, stopping at noon at a 
little Koordish village for lunch, which we had eaten in the 
wagon. Our lunch consisted of bread — which was rather 
dry, after having been carried in the wagon for six days — 
some native butter, which, at its best was never inviting, 
boiled eggs, cold meat, and doughnuts, all of which were 
stale enough after their long journey. It was cold in the 
wagon, but it was so much cleaner than any other place 
in the neighborhood that it seemed desirable to stay there. 



AN UNATTRACTIVE OUTLOOK. 631 

AH, our trusty servant, succeeded in finding a fire some- 
where, sufficient to brew some tea, which made the repast a 
trifle more cheerful, for the tea at least was hot. The 
village was one of the poorest and dirtiest on the route. 
From my seat in the wagon were to be seen, by actual 
count, thirteen dead sheep, a dead camel, a dead dog, and a 
dead donkey, all lying in the village streets, left there for 
nature to take care of. Some of therm had evidently been 
dead a good many days. Not a pleasant outlook, to be sure, 
nor one that contributed to the enjoyment of our frugal 
meal. 

It hardly seems possible that people could really live 
amid such surroundings. And yet the little, dirty, ragged 
children trotted about the streets, picking their way past 
dead animals and live dogs with equal indifference, and 
apparently as happy as any other children anywhere, and 
looking hale and hearty, too, in spite of the filth and dirt. 

"We often found compensation for all the jolting over 
rough roads in the great beauty of the scenery, after leaving 
the barren plain and getting into the hilly region again. 
With a north wind blowing in our faces all day we found 
ourselves so cold, as the night drew near, that we were glad 
enough when at last we reached the little village where we 
were to spend the night, knowing full well what kind of 
quarters we should probably find. 

Did it ever happen to you, my sister, to take a long, cold, 
wearisome journey, and then to find when you reached home 
at night, a warm, pleasant room, with a bright, cheery open 
fire, and a good hot supper waiting for you ? Did you not 
forget all the weariness of the journey in the pleasant home- 
coming ? Visions of that sort entranced us occasionally as 
we journeyed, but alas, they were only visions. What we 

usually found at the end of the day's journey was the same 

38 



632 A NIGHT IN A STABLE. 

little dirty Turkish village of low stone buildings, occupied 
by surly Turks. I remember one night, especially, when the 
owners of the miserable house were so cross that they either 
could not or would not find the key to the only guest 
chamber in the village. They were tired and hungry, for it 
was the month of " Ramazan ", — they had been keeping fast 
all day — and they did not feel amiable enough to do any- 
thing for those "Giaours". 

At last, however, after patient waiting, the key was found 
and the door unlocked. Passing through the stable, which 
was worse than any American stable could possibly be, then 
up a flight of dirty stone steps, we were ushered into a little 
room directly over the stable. Leaving me to my own 
meditations, the men hurried out to unpack the wagon. I 
looked around for the cleanest place in the room, but there 
wasn't any. There was no place to sit down, so I stood up, 
glad that it was so dark that I couldn't see how dirty it was. 
How I longed for my own cellar at home, or my neighbor's 
barn chamber ! I even felt a sympathy for the prodigal son 
when he envied his father's servants. Fortunately there was 
not much time for the dolef uls, for soon the tramping of feet 
on the stairs proclaimed the arrival of the bed and trunks 
and provisions. It seemed to be absolutely necessary either 
to laugh or cry, and with a " Herculaneum effort," as Mrs. 
Partington would have said, I decided to laugh. The cot 
beds were soon set up, and one of them served for a table 
and the other for a lounge. The one small candle gave a 
feeble light, reminding one of those lines of Milton's, 

"No light but rather darkness visible 
Served only to discover scenes of woe." 

The canvas-covered, rickety cot bed made a table that 
was never to be depended upon, and neither was it so 
attractive as some : but when it was covered with a table- 



IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN WORSE. 633 

cloth, it answered the purpose very well, and harmonized 
with the surroundings. Ali succeeded in getting some hot 
water, and made something which he averred was cocoa, and 
though we had neither milk nor sugar to go with it, we 
supped and ate our dry bread and stale butter, and tried to 
be thankful that things were no worse. 

When the door of the room was shut it kept out some of 
the odors of the stable. There were three tiny little win- 
dows in the room, each about eight or nine inches square 
and completely covered with paper tightly pasted on. 
After bearing it as long as we could, we broke some of these 
paper panes for the sake of fresh air, though the outside air 
was not much better than that on the inside. 

Perhaps my readers may wonder why we were willing 
to sleep in such a 'place, but such Avondering is easily an- 
wered. In the first place it must be said that we did not 
qleep much, we only stayed there, and in the second place it 
was only "Hobson's choice" — it was that or nothing. 
That was the best room in the village, and the next village 
was twenty miles away. 

We were thankful when the night was over and were 
perfectly willing to rise early in the morning and go on our 
way. The experience of each day and night was very 
much alike. "We enjoyed the interesting glimpses of home 
life to be seen nowhere else than on such a journey as this, 
and one or two days spent with native Armenian families 
added variety to the experiences. We were cordially wel- 
comed in these native Christian homes and were treated 
with great hospitality, and although Armenian ways are not 
American ways, and some of their customs were not easy to 
adopt, yet we retain only pleasant memories of those visits 
with our Armenian friends. 

It was an interesting sight to see a tiny Armenian baby 



634 IN ARMENIAN HOMES. 

put to bed in one of these homes. A little blanket was first 
laid in the cradle, then a small sheet, then some warm, dry 
sand, and last the baby. The sheet, blanket, and two or 
three little quilts were then drawn around him, and the 
baby was securely tied down, blankets and quilts and all, 
and there he must lie till morning, with no power to move 
anything except his head. The little one usually accepted 
the situation cheerfully and submitted with good grace. 

The women in these Christian families were treated 
kindly by their husbands, but their position was an inferior 
one. They waited upon their husbands and their guests 
at the table, and then took their own meals by themselves 
afterwards. They appeared happy and contented, but to an 
American woman their lives seemed hard and narrow. 

But what a joyful company we were when the first part 
of the journey was over, and we arrived at the homes of 
missionary friends in Cassarea and Talas. It was like a peep 
into paradise to come into a clean Christian home. 

How Ave appreciated the common, every-day mercies that 
we had so often forgotten before. Did you ever count up 
your mercies, good housekeepers at home ? Do you know 
how good it is to live in a house and sleep in a bed ? Are 
you sufficiently thankful for clean dishes, or for the privi- 
lege of making them clean? Are you grateful for cold 
water and a clean glass to drink it out of ? Did you ever 
think how pleasant it is to have a plate all to yourself to eat 
breakfast from, instead of having one dish set in the center 
of the table for all the family to dip their spoons into? Are 
you thankful enough for the good bread that you eat every 
clay? Do you ever thank the Lord that you have not a 
house full of fleas? Are you thankful that your neighbor 
has clean hands so that you can shake them without a 
shiver ? 



DISCOMFORTS OF THE MISSIONARIES. 



635 



If my experiences on this overland journey through 
Turkey serve to make any one more thankful for the bless- 
ings of home, or to make any of us feel more sympathy for 
our missionary friends who have to endure many more dis- 
comforts than have been hinted at here, and who endure 
them cheerfully and gladly for the sake of the work, then 
the purpose for which this brief record has been written will 
have been accomplished. 



^l 




CHAPTER V. 

GOOD-BYE. 
•GOD BE WITH YOU TILL WE MEET AGAIN." 

The Departure from San Francisco — The Crowded Wharf — "All Ashore 
that's Going Ashore " — The Song of Farewell — The Captain's Encour- 
agement — Good Cheer for All — A Never-to-be-forgotten Song — In 
Moreton Bay — On Board the Chingtu — Our Friends on the Launch — 
Chattering Chinese — A Voice from the Tarshaw — An Unappreciative 
Listener — Another Precious Memory — At a Railway Station in Oka- 
yama — Japanese Courtesy — The Train Waits for the Song — In a 
Chinese Schoolroom — The Lively Little Junior — The Dear Old Hymn 
in Chinese — In a Little Hill Town of India — Departure in the Early 
Morning — Surrounded by Ghosts — "God Be With You "in Hindu 
Dialect — A Brown-faced Boy Choir — Sweet, Lingering Echoes — A 
Blessed Memory of Friends in Distant Lands. 




HE good steamship Mariposa is 
just ready to sail from San Fran- 
cisco for Sydney. The last 
warning has been given — " All 
ashore that's going ashore" — 
and the wharf is crowded with 
people who are waiting to wave 
a last good-bye to friends on 
board. The last whistle sounds 
and the steamer is off. But as 
she starts, some earnest Christ- 
ian Endeavorers on the shore lift 

up their voices, and the sweet strains of " God be with you 

till we meet again," float on the air. 

The passengers are walking up and down the deck talking 

busily together, but they pause a minute as they hear the 

(636 ) 







BEGINNING THE LONG JOURNEY. 637 

sweot sounds. The captain is full of serious thoughts of the 
long voyage before him, and of the great responsibility that 
rests upon him, and there is a lump in his throat, so he tells 
us afterwards, as he stops to listen to the words : 

" When life's perils thick confound you, 
Put His loving arms around you." 

and the " God be with you " will linger in his mind for many 
a day as he sails over the lonely seas. 

The sailors who are hoisting the Stars and Stripes, pause 
a minute as they catch the sound of 

" Keep love's banner floating o'er you," 

and the timid passenger who feared the dangers of the long 
voyage was cheered as she heard the reassuring words. 

Fainter and fainter grow the sounds, but three pilgrims 
still linger, looking longingly towards the shore to catch the 
very last strains. They are starting on a long, long journey, 
and their hearts are sore at the thought of all they are leav- 
ing behind them, and of the long year that must intervene 
before their return. As the last faint 

" God be with you till we meet again " 

dies away upon the air, their hearts are cheered and com- 
forted, as they go on their way. 

Perhaps those Christian Endeavorers will never know 
just how many were helped and strengthened by their song 
that hot August day, but those who were helped will not 
-soon forget the song or the singers. 

IN AUSTRALIA. 
Once more the scene is on shipboard, but this time the 
crew and many of the passengers are Chinese. The steamer 
Chingtu, which has been anchored for a few hours in More- 
ton Bay, is just starting on a three- weeks voyage from Aus- 
tralia to China. Near by is a little steam launch which has 



638 THE PARTING SONG. 

come from Brisbane, to bring some passengers ; and a com- 
pany of our friends, who have come so far with us, are wait- 
ing for a last good-bye. 

The captain stands on the deck talking with one of the 
passengers. The crew are busy in their several places, and 
the Chinese passengers on the forward deck are jabbering 
fast and loud. Three pilgrims on the upper deck are leaning 
over the rail for a last look at kind friends whom they are 
leaving, and, just as the steamer starts, a voice from the Tar- 
shaw strikes up the tune " God be with you till we meet 
again." 

A gentleman who is standing near, turns to the captain 
and remarks : " You never had such a send-off as this before, 
did you ? " " No," says the captain, gruffly, " and I don't 
want to again," and they both turn away and walk to the 
other side of the deck, but, as he turns, the captain cannot 
help hearing the sweet " God be with you," and it may be 
that the words still linger in his memory to help him in some 
future hour, though he cares not for them now. 

The few first-class passengers seem indifferent, and the 
Chinamen on the lower deck cannot understand the song; 
but to the three pilgrims, Avho are still looking lovingly 
across the water as the Tar sham sails awa} T , the words have 
another precious memory associated with them, and they lis- 
ten eagerly till the very last note dies away in the distance. 

IN JAPAN. 

This time the scene is in a railway station in Okayama. 
We have taken our seats in the train, and while we rejoice to 
be facing homewards, }^et our joy is tinged with sadness as 
we say a last good-bye to dear missionary friends and Jap- 
anese friends alike. 

We wonder when or where we shall meet ao-ain these 



THE SONG IN JAPAN AND CHINA. 639 

friends who are so dear to us, when suddenly, the sweet 
notes of " God be with you till we meet again," ring out on 
the air. Japanese voices and American voices take up the 
strain, and the Japanese railway guards stop to listen. It is 
past the hour for the train to start, but Japanese politeness 
will not interrupt the sweet good-bye, and even the " Impe- 
rial Japanese Railway" waits for that song. 

As the last " God be with you " dies away, the train starts 
on its journey, while the three pilgrims go on their way 
with a song in their hearts. 

IN CHINA. 

Imagine a large schoolroom not very unlike an old- 
fashioned New England schoolroom. The desks are not of 
the latest style, and the room is not very elegant, but it has 
been prettily decorated. On the walls hang bright-colored 
scrolls, with Chinese characters inscribed on them, express- 
ing cordial greetings. In the back of the room are pretty 
floral decorations, also in Chinese characters, giving a Chinese 
welcome. The rows of benches are filled with bright-eyed 
boys and young men, dressed in Chinese costume, and with 
their long queues hanging down their backs. 

In the back of the room are a few Chinese women, and 
one little Chinese baby, who has come to this Christian En- 
deavor meeting, probably to represent Junior Endeavor. 
The meeting is a very interesting one though it is all in 
Chinese, and the little junior adds to the interest by creeping 
down the aisle and expressing his applause by patting on the 
platform with his baby hands. 

Just before the close of the meeting, some slips of red 
paper on which are inscribed some Chinese characters, are 
passed around among the audience. A twelve-year-old 
Chinaman takes his place at the cabinet organ, and the audi- 
ence all rise and begin to sing. The complicated Chinese 



640 OUR GOD-SPEED FROM INDIA. 

characters on the red paper are unreadable, and the unpro- 
nounceable words have no meaning to American ears, but 
there was no mistaking the tune. Once more the three pil- 
grims listened to the beautiful " God be with } r ou," and 
though they could not join in singing the Chinese words, yet 
they understood the tune and in the spirit could join in the 
song. Then in Chinese and English, the prayer arose, 

" By His counsel's guide, uphold you, 
With His sheep securely fold you. 
God be with you till we meet again." 

May that prayer be answered, and may all who sung it 
that day in that great heathen city be ready always to fol- 
low the teachings of the " Good Shepherd," and be led by 
Him in the paths of righteousness ! 

IN INDIA. 

It was early morning in the little hill town of Madana- 
pali, so early that even the first rays of the sun could not 
yet be seen, and the moon was still shining brightly in the 
heavens. It is three o'clock in the morning, and the three 
pilgrims are just starting on their homeward journey. The 
large old-fashioned missionary wagon, drawn by diminutive 
white oxen, stands at the door, for they are seven miles from 
the nearest railway station. 

As they climb up into the high wagon, and start on their 
long drive, they take one last look around them. How quiet 
and peaceful it all looks ! There is the mission bungalow 
and the long, low school building, and the little church on 
the other side of the compound. Suddenly, some ghostly 
figures rise before them in the moonlight and surround the 
wagon. Before they have time to be alarmed, they recog- 
nize the ghosts, for these are the boys from the mission 
school. Draped in their white clothes, some with white tur- 



GOD BE WITH YOU TILL WE MEET AGAIN. 



641 



bans and some with brown caps on their heads, they have 
come out at this early hour for a last good-bye. 

As the little white oxen start, the boys run along by the 
side of the wagon, singing their farewell : 

" God be with you till we meet again. 
When life's perils thick confound you, 
Put His loving arms around you, 
God be with you till we meet again." 

This time the song is sung in the Telugu tongue, but it 
sounds sweetly in the ears of the pilgrims as they ride away 
over the hills, and they will not soon forget the bright, 
brown-faced Indian boys who sung it. 

Many more memory pictures might be given if time 
and space allowed. To these three pilgrims the song, " God 
be with you till we meet again," will always bring up many 
delightful memories of their journeyings in other lands. 




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